2022 Winner
PRIDE OF MANCHESTER
Pixiebelle Sykes
Astonished doctors with her determination after battling her way through more than three years of chemotherapy for a rare brain tumour.
PixieBelle, nine, has endured four brain operations, lost her hair three times, and has also lost sight in one of her eyes after gruelling chemotherapy treatment.
She was diagnosed with pilocytic astrocytoma aged five after her parents took her for an eye test. They had noticed that her right eye was looking slightly to one side.
Devastatingly, an MRI scan revealed the rare tumour behind her eye and doctors drew up an 84-week treatment plan. Her father Andy, 39, explains: “Up until her diagnosis, Pixie had always been completely fit and healthy, a really happy young girl so we were stunned when we were told she had a brain tumour.”
In December 2018, after 21 weeks of chemotherapy, she had an adverse reaction to the drugs, and had to start all over again from week one, with different medication. It meant that PixieBelle, from Ashton-under-Lyne, had to endure a total of 111 sessions of treatment at Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital.
Finally, in October 2021, PixieBelle was able to ring the final bell, indicating that she had reached the end of treatment.
Sadly, just three months later a scan showed signs that the tumour had regrown. Andy explains: “It was unexpected and we were stunned but it was something we had been warned by doctors could happen. However, we were delighted to get PixieBelle onto an experimental new medical trial pretty much straight away to target the tumour directly.”
Now aged nine, the youngster is just one of 60 people worldwide benefiting from the treatment, which unlike chemotherapy, is taken in tablet form. Mum Katie says: “There are far fewer side effects, and PixieBelle is able to pretty much carry on life on as normal. She loves to dance and perform and everything she has had to go through she has just embraced and pushed through.
“She has been so incredibly brave and has inspired family, friends and people from all around her community to fundraise for the Royal Manchester Children’s Hospital Charity. In our area, everyone knows PixieBelle, she is a shining light.”
Determined to give back the family found out the hospital needed a new MRI scanner for children needing brain surgery. Together with friends, a local football club and her school they have raised more than £45,000 towards the fund through various fundraising events.