'Make sure she remembers me': Grandchildren inspire cancer battle
Graham Tippen's greatest fear is his two-year-old granddaughter Lily not remembering him.
Every moment is precious because he does not know how much time he has left.
Cancer is the problem and if Tippen does not find enough money for treatment, he will have less time with Lily and his other grandchildren – Millie, 8, Mia, 9, and Henry, 7.
'I'm not sure if it's selfish or whatever, but I really want to do what I can to make sure she remembers me,' Tippen said.
The 65-year-old found out he had rectal cancer in February 2020 after getting a scan because he was concerned about some bleeding.
Another scan later revealed the cancer had spread to his liver and lungs.
Tippen started chemotherapy on the first day of level four Covid-19 lockdown.
Given only months to live, he has beaten the odds and has been living with cancer for more than five years.
Tippen cherishes time with all his grandchildren along with his wife Chris and adult children, Laura and Ben.
Tippen's life expectancy today is unclear, but there is a hope of holding off further tumour growth for a few months with a particular treatment regime.
A small number of patients have responded especially well to the treatment and had tumour growth slowed for even longer.
But the cost is steep – more than $11,000 a month for six months.
Tippen requires the drugs Lonsurf and Vegzelma, neither of which are funded by Pharmac in his case.
Pharmac pharmaceuticals director Geraldine MacGibbon said Vegzelma is funded for some types of inoperable liver cancer which have spread to other parts of the body.
There had been no application to Pharmac for Lonsurf to be funded, she said.
Tippen does not qualify for Vegzelma funding as his cancer originated in his rectum rather than his liver.
His family has launched a Givealittle campaign to help cover treatment costs and possibly fund a short holiday for him and Chris.
Tippen will start the treatment in coming weeks and will need five more monthly rounds.
While he can pay for the first round of treatment with the help of insurance, the rest will need to be paid for through fundraising.
Tippen is no stranger to the radiology field, having spent 18 years in IT at Pacific Radiology.
Receiving treatment in the near-empty St George's Hospital on the first day of lockdown was surreal.
'Of course there's always a focus on patient first, but in my job there was not much patient interaction. So you sort of end up viewing people as numbers and not quite real,' he said.
Tippen was nervous about treatment but was encouraged by the kindness shown towards patients.
'Being on the other side of the fence now, you really get to see what an amazing job the CT techs and MRI techs do handling the patients. There's a lot of care there,' he said.
Before retiring on medical leave in 2022, Tippen helped maintain and monitor the complex computer systems inside MRI and CT scanners.
These days, the most important thing for him is spending as much time as possible with his grandchildren. He is currently on school drop-off duty most days during the week and enjoys taking the grandchildren out on weekend activities.
Like many families in similar situations, Tippen and his wife have considered the possibility of selling their home to help pay for the treatment.
'You have to really weigh all that stuff up. It's very hard to balance up the extra time you get with these drugs with selling the house off. My wife is in perfect health so I don't want to leave her with nothing,' he said.
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