WEYBURN – A Weyburn woman, Ashley Culham, is undergoing treatment in Mexico for cancer, and a gofundme page has been set up to help her and her family with their expenses.
Culham is currently an Animal Bioscience student at the University of Saskatchewan.
At first she was diagnosed and treated for osteosarcoma in 2019 while a student at the University of Regina, and she has undergone four different treatment regimens, including chemotherapy, radiation, chemo pills, and an experimental treatment brought in from Europe.
She completed her courses online at home until late summer of 2021, when she became ill and needed a blood transfusion. X-rays taken at this time showed her cancer had aggressively moved into her lungs.
Doctors here were unable provide any treatment, but the Culham family found there alternative treatment options available in Mexico and she was accepted there for treatment.
She travelled to Tijuana with her parents, Tim and Denise, in December 2021, while Ashley participated in her U of S classes online.
The treatments are experimental and expensive, and the family is responsible for the costs, spending about $75,000 so far.
The treatments resulted in eight days of hospitalization due to unforeseen complications, and Ashley has now contracted COVID-19, which will mean more expense as she is treated in hospital.
Ashley’s grandmother, Linda Neiszner, is in charge of accessing the funds and transferring them to Tim and Denise, as it is very difficult to set up banking while they are in Mexico.
As of Tuesday afternoon, the gofundme page had raised $33,815 from 166 donations, with the goal to raise $60,000 to help the family.
To be updated on Ashley’s situation, or to make a donation, go to https://gofund.me/c0b4e2a2 and look under the title, “Help fund Ashley Culham’s cancer treatment”.
