Katie has Cancer

January 5, 2007 permalink

Katie Wernecke has cancer again. She was the girl at the center of a long legal struggle between the family and Texas child protectors. On June 5, 2005 she was seized by force and sent for treatment to M D Anderson Cancer Center, where surgeons removed her thymus on June 30. After her chances of survival had dropped below 25%, a Texas judge returned Katie to her family on November 3, 2005. Without a thymus, her immune system is not whole, and is not fighting the current cancer. Below is the latest report from her father.

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Katie's Cancer Has Spread To New Areas

The original medistinum mass was dead. About 6 weeks after our last CAT scan Katie started having pain on her right side at the lower ribs. An MRI revealed a large mass there. This is at and below the scar where they put a chest tube in to drain her lung. We believe this cancer was seeded when they removed the chest tube. A CT/PET scan on November 10th revealed multiple hot spots of cancer. We spent the month of November in treatment again in California. We returned home on December 1st.

On December 12th we travel to Mississippi to get a second opinion. We start some immunotherapy to help Katie's body fight the cancer. Katie has not been able to mount an immune response because M.D. Anderson removed her thymus gland back on June 30, 2005 without our approval. When we asked why, the doctor at M. D. Anderson said "she didn't need it." Well, the thymus makes your t-cell and b-cell lymphoctyes and makes the hormones that regulate all of the immune system. We returned on Christmas Day. This cancer has proved resistant to all chemo and radiation treatments. So we are trying something different.

Edward

Source: Pray for Katie 1 blog

Addendum: Two years later a TV station says Katie has been cancer-free for five years.

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Cancer Patient Healthy Five Years Later

By Kara Sewell (WICHITA, Kan.)

In a case of convention versus conviction, Katie Wernecke's parents won.

But before their victory Katie's family underwent a month long legal battle after her parents refused traditional chemotherapy to treat their daughters Hodgkin's disease.

A Texas judge finally allowed Katie to come here Wichita's Bright Spot for Health, for alternative treatment.

"It's really a very difficult thing for a parent to feel like the child is going to be taken out of their hands and i know as a father myself i would be very upset," says Dr. Ron Hunninghake.

Dr. Ron Hunninghake treated Katie. He says the center's intravenous Vitamin C therapy coupled with chemo saved her life.

5 years later....

"Katie Wernecke is completely healed now and is your typical teenager doing well," says Hunninghake.

So, when he heard about Daniel Hause, the 13-year-old missing with his mother, he thought of Katie.

The same age and disease, Hause's mother fled to seek natural treatment instead of chemotherapy.

Dr. Hunninghake isn't surprised the boy's mother ran.

"I think if doctors handle patients like this correctly it can be a both, rather than an either or," says Hunninghake.

But he says conventional doctors view treatment as black and white. Since Hodgkins survival rate is high if treated they would never consider alternative medicine.

While Dr. Hunninghake doesn't discount chemo or radiation by allowing both he says patients could end up healthy, like Katie.

"We don't really propose it as a substitute for conventional therapy but it's a very good adjunct to conventional therapy for people who are undergoing cancer treatments," says Dr. Hunninghake.

"The Bright Spot of Health treats between 70 and 100 people a year with their Vitamin C therapy, they say most of those patients are also receiving radiation or chemotherapy."

Source: KWCH Wichita