Almaze beats cancer a second time

ALMAZE Beukes (14) has been diagnosed with cancer for the second time in her life.

She was first diagnosed with osteosarcoma or bone cancer in her right knee in 2008. She had been suffering from pain in her leg for a year before finally being diagnosed with cancer.
After the right diagnosis was made she immediately received chemotherapy and was later taken to Cape Town for surgery.
Doctors could save her leg and reconstructed her knee and upper leg and gave her a prosthesis. Every six months the prosthesis has to be adjusted until she is 18 years old and stops growing.
Last year in September Beukes stated experiencing pain in her arm and immediately went to the doctor. She was once again wrongly diagnosed and told she had growing pains.
Just before Christmas another doctor did a spinal tap which revealed a tumour next to her spine, pressing against her aorta in her chest. Again she was put on chemotherapy and luckily the tumour shrank. Beukes was taken to Cape Town where Dr Henning du Toit and Professor Mark de Groot removed the remaining growth. She is back in Namibia now and free of cancer.
She still has to go for follow-up visits to Dr Anel Zietzman at the Bernard May Cancer Care Centre in Windhoek.
‘I hope that I can stay clear of cancer so that I can start and finish high school next year,’ she says. After school she wants to become a stewardess or a paramedic on board a luxury cruise ship.
‘I want to travel and see the world,’ she says.

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