The ManicaPost
Daniel Mhonda Post Correspondent
A SAKUBVA family has resigned to watching the condition of their son who was diagonised with a rare cancer – rhabdomyosercoma (RMS) – on the head deteriorating after doctors who twice operated him have reportedly given up hope and put him under palliative care as the tumour continuously recur.
So heart poking is the condition of Carlisto Mbaimbai, of House Number 17 Ellis Gledhill, Sakubva, who had his left eye plucked out in an operation while the tumour has devoured the skull, exposing the brains.
The family struggles with dressing his wound, and are appealing for both financial and medicinal assistance to manage his condition.
Online research describes Rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS), a tumour of skeletal muscle origin, as the second most common soft tissue sarcoma encountered in childhood after osteosarcoma, whose common sites of occurrence are the head and neck region.
RMS is a highly malignant tumour with extensive local invasions and early hemorrhagic and lymphatic dissemination and despite aggressive approaches incorporating surgery, dose-intensive combination chemotherapy and radiation therapy, the outcome for patients with the metastatic disease remains poor.
Carlisto’s head keeps swelling and has resultantly deformed his facial outlooks.
He constantly experiences excruciating headaches, convulsions and now hardly talks.
The boy’s father Mr Gwarai
Mbaimbai said the ailment was diagnosed in 2015, after which his son underwent to constructive surgeries at Parirenyatwa Group of Hospital.
However, the family is troubled that the surgeries appear to have failed to give them the solace they were expecting as doctors seems to deem the condition as terminal.
“Carlisto was doing Grade Two at Mutanda Primary when I received a call from the school authorities in 2015 informing me that my son had collapsed at school while playing with other kids and was bleeding through the nose and mouth. The condition worsened, forcing him out of school,” explained Mr Mbaimbai.
“Carlisto was first referred to Mutare Provincial Hospital from where he was transferred to Parirenyatwa as his condition needed specialist doctors.
“He was a brilliant boy with prospects for a great future, but was forced out of school because of this condition, rhabdomyosercoma. Since 2015 we have been in and out of the hospital.
“They did radiation and chemotherapy and all that has failed to yield positive results. The boy requires special diet, which the family cannot afford. He survives on cereals and fluids and we are appealing to well wishers to assist us in whichever way so that we find treatment from elsewhere.
“In Zimbabwe they said there is no medication for him so we want to try and get the medication from outside the country. We are limited financially. We have been surviving on money from the relatives and well-wishers like churches,” he said.
According to Carlisto’s medical records, doctors indicated that they could no longer do anything on his condition other than giving him medication that assists in easing physical pain.
They recommended palliative care.
The Mbaimbai family can be contacted on 0784729721.
