'We're Not Gonna Ever Give Up': 2-Year-Old Vincent 'The Conqueror' Determined To Beat Battle Ahead After 8th Brain Surgery
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - It is our 14th annual Alex Scott: A Stand For Hope Telethon. This year because of the pandemic, the telethon is virtual. We're raising money in the fight against childhood cancer.
Children like Vincent Nowroozi need your help. Vincent is only 2 years old and has had eight brain surgeries. He deserves better treatment options that don't make him sick. He deserves a cure.
Two-and-a-half-year old Vincent has always defied the challenges he's been dealt. Here he is less than two days after his eighth brain surgery last month.
Now his family is battling to prevent the cancer from coming back.
"We're facing, again, another relapse, in a situation where we're like panicking now. We're out of options, really. And we're really just throwing hail marys," Vincent's mother Natalie Nowroozi said.
When he was 4 months old, Vincent was diagnosed with atypical teratoid rhabdoid tumors, a very rare form of cancerous tumors.
When we first met vincent, his parents Natalie and Ramin, and sister Meena, last summer he was about to undergo a stem cell transplant. The procedure was successful.
"Whenever we go in there, we go with a lot of fear, anticipating the worst, but he always ends up doing really well," Vincent's father Ramin Nowroozi said.
But this past January, Vincent relapsed. He had surgery to remove a tumor, then started a new chemotherapy treatment. Last month, yet another tumor appeared -- it was removed just five days before our interview.
"I've been saying my prayers and everything and he's been getting better, and better," Vincent's sister Mina Nowroozi said.
"Everybody says, what can we do, what can we do? We really don't know. The only thing anybody can do to make a difference is to find a cure," Natalie said.
That's where Alex's Lemonade Foundation is stepping up again to help the Nowroozi family. The foundation's new Clinical Trial Navigator Program helps families like theirs sort through the complicated process of determining whether they are eligible for clinical trials.
"We eat, sleep and breathe trying to find an option for Vincent," Natalie said. "Having that real person who is talking to you and communicating, and really trying to find you that help is incredible."
They're now in the process of trying to get approval to use a drug that doesn't yet have FDA approval for Vincent's illness or for pediatric patients -- right now, they say it's their only hope.
"We're not gonna ever give up," Natalie said. "I didn't know what resiliency and grit looked like until I met and gave birth to Vincent.
"Vincent, The Conqueror," they call him -- printed right on their T-shirts. A fighter, overcomer, and charming little boy determined to beat this next battle ahead.
There are three ways to donate: you can help Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation find better and safer treatments and cures for childhood cancer.
Call now: 866-333-1213 -- phone lines are open until 8 p.m. Friday.
You can go online: CBSPhilly.com/alexs or text to donate: text "CBSAlex" to 44321.
