Two-year-old Nottingham girl finishes treatment after overcoming tennis ball-sized brain tumour

Video: Kate Chaplin speaks to the mother of Jorja Dawson who won her battle with cancer

A two-year-old Nottingham girl has finished her treatment after overcoming a brain tumour that was the size of a tennis ball.

Jorja Dawson was diagnosed with the tumour on the day of her mother’s birthday last year but rang the bell on the oncology ward at the QMC yesterday (Thursday February 2) to mark the end of her treatment.

Speaking to Notts TV’s Kate Chaplin, Jorja’s mother Carla McFarlane recalled her daughter’s, and the family’s, ordeal.

She said: “Every time I took her to the doctors they said that she just had a virus and that she’ll get over it.

“The first time she was sick was on March 11 2016; I then took her to A&E as she was unwell again and they said again that she had a virus.

“I wasn’t happy so two days later, I took her back to the doctors and they said that she was holding her head funny which can be a sign of a brain tumour.

“The doctor said that they would treat her for an ear infection but if it didn’t get better to come back in.

“I took her into the doctors on April 4, which is my birthday, and they sent her straight to hospital and she had a scan the next day when they told us it was a brain tumour.”

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Jorja Dawson with mother Carla McFarlane

Carla said that as a mother, it’s the worst thing that a parent can hear.

She said: “Where the tumour was situated, it blocked a ventricle which meant her head was filling and filling with fluid.

“She had a ventriculostomy and at the same time they tried to remove the tumour but it was just full of blood vessels which, if removed, meant she would have bled to death.

“We had to just go through the chemotherapy route to shrink it and it kept shrinking after the chemotherapy!

“We had our last treatment at the centre yesterday and Jorja rang the bell to mark the occasion.”

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