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Caring Decisions

Nicky’s story

  • Laurie's son Nicky was diagnosed with a brain tumour when he was two years old. Doctors told Laurie that Nicky's condition was very serious.

    "The outlook wasn't very good when he was diagnosed. He did get to the stage where the tumour was removed…and we were quite hopeful but in about two months it came back"


    Nicky had surgery and chemotherapy. His parents looked hard into different treatments. "We researched into whether there would be any trials that he would be able to do." But Nicky's treatment wasn't working.

    "it was easy to tell that it wasn't helping…having been through chemotherapy and hospital stays and just the invasiveness of it… we knew that we didn't want to make him go through pain that wasn't going to be helpful for him"

         "it became apparent that it just wasn't working and there was nothing else that we could do besides keep him comfortable and take him home"


    Nurses from the hospital were available to help and support Nicky's family. He died at home 8 months after diagnosis of his brain tumour.