DEAR PCF FRIENDS,

When Alex was four, we took him on a family visit to Australia. Two days into our trip, Alex was diagnosed with Ph+ Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL). Shortly afterwards, Alex slipped into a coma and our family was left devastated and confused. As a result of his illness, he became extremely disabled due to the disease entering his central nervous system.

For Alex, immediate chemotherapy treatment in Australia was the only option in order to get him well enough to travel home to New York to be treated at one of the hospitals PCF supports. Alex endured many harrowing effects of these treatments, which left him so sick that we often did not know what was worse, the treatment or the cancer.

Yet treatment prevailed. Alex now proudly goes to school and runs and plays with his friends, just like any other child his age.

Our family is grateful to Pediatric Cancer Foundation for funding state-of-the-art equipment as well as their research grants which help so many families stricken with cancer.

To celebrate our son's second chance at life, and to represent all of the children who fight every day to be cured, Alex invites you to the "Give Hope Walk"� on Sunday, April 29, 2012, at Riverside Park, 79th Street Boat Basin, for Pediatric Cancer Foundation.

Come and join us to ...hold the hand of a child in need today.

With gratitude,
The Conoscente Family