'Closer to home'- New hospital programs bring childhood cancer care to northwestern Ontario

Rajpreet Sahota · CBC News

· Posted: Jun 05, 2025 4:51 PM EDT | Last Updated: June 5

Childhood crab attraction is becoming much accessible to families successful northwestern Ontario with the motorboat of 2 caller programs astatine Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre. 

For years, families successful the portion person had to question to the Children's Hospital astatine London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) for the bulk of puerility crab treatments. The expanded Pediatric Oncology Group of Ontario (POGO) Satellite Clinic and the POGO Interlink Nursing programme are acceptable to trim the request for long-distance question for pediatric crab patients and their families.

The POGO Satellite Clinic volition connection specialized services, including chemotherapy and follow-up care. Meanwhile, the POGO Interlink Nurse volition supply families with indispensable support, ensuring entree to indispensable services some wrong the infirmary and successful their community.

The programs were made imaginable done backing from Ontario's Ministry of Health.

"We cognize firsthand what it meant to beryllium distant from location portion our kid was successful treatment. Now, parents won't ever person to permission their jobs oregon divided their families apart. You can't enactment a terms connected that benignant of bid of mind," said Shanley and Drago Pavletic, parents from Thunder Bay.

The constitution of these caller programs astatine the Thunder Bay infirmary means that attraction is present disposable person to home, easing the affectional and fiscal load connected families already navigating the challenges of crab treatment.

It's thing that the Pavletics cognize first-hand. They shared their acquisition of the toll that question for crab attraction took connected their family. Their son, Luke, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia soon aft his 2nd birthday, requiring aggregate trips to London for attraction implicit respective years.

"Those 3 years of crab attraction took its toll emotionally, financially and mentally," Drago Pavletic said. Luke is present successful Grade 2. 

"Establishing a section outer session successful Thunder Bay volition assistance our bluish families get portion of their attraction person to home. They won't person to permission their jobs oregon divided their families apart, which volition hopefully alleviate a batch of the anxiousness we faced."

Luke's treatment, which required regular chemotherapy for respective years, often meant 17-hour drives to London, sometimes compounded by formation cancellations oregon terrible upwind conditions. The Pavletic household recovered themselves balancing Luke's attraction with the attraction of their daughter, Petra, backmost home.

The POGO Satellite Clinic offers a broad attraction approach, with a multidisciplinary squad of doctors, nurses, kid beingness specialists and societal workers to supply some objective and affectional enactment for children and families. This includes continuous attraction from diagnosis to surviving the disease, and, erstwhile necessary, end-of-life care.

"We person an unthinkable squad present successful Thunder Bay who has been serving and supporting families for many, galore months,"  Lauren Ettin, CEO of POGO said. "This formalizes this concern and truly implements it arsenic a due programme astatine the Thunder Bay Regional Health Science Centre, with teams crossed the state moving unneurotic to beforehand attraction for children and younker who person cancer."

The programs besides purpose to enactment section healthcare providers by offering acquisition and adept guidance to guarantee that attraction is accordant and of the highest quality.

"By bringing these captious services person to home, we assistance to guarantee our young patients person the aforesaid high-quality attraction they would astatine Children's Hospital, but wrong their ain community," said Dr. Alexandra Zorzi, Head of Pediatric Hematology and Oncology astatine LHSC. 

"Our interdisciplinary teams, including a dedicated Interlink nurse, volition usher families done each signifier of the pediatric crab journey, reducing question burdens, supporting continuity of care, and helping to amended wellness outcomes," said Dr. Rhonda Crocker Ellacott, President and CEO of Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre. 

For Luke Pavletic, the caller POGO programs connection anticipation for a brighter aboriginal for different families and children facing akin struggles.

"I anticipation they consciousness good. I anticipation erstwhile it's done, they consciousness better," said Luke.

With files from Sarah Law