Basketball hero Lauren Hill is suffering from a rare pediatric disease called Diffuse Intrinsic Pontine Glioma (DIPG). Doctors said she wouldn't live until Christmas. Today, not only did the 19-year-old spend Christmas with her family, but she's ending 2014 having achieved her fundraising goal for The Cure Starts Now Foundation.
In a telethon Tuesday, Hill managed to reach her $1 million funding goal for cancer research, a project she had set out to accomplish at the end of the year.
Brooke Desserich from The Cure Starts Now recounted that just as they were waiting for the last $9,000 to meet their goal, they received a walk-in donation of $116,000. That's well beyond what they were waiting for, putting Hill's total money raised to more than $1.15 million. During the telethon, over $350,000 were raised within 13 and a half hours.
"This is amazing. Reaching that goal is amazing. I mean, to reach it this fast and to have so many people that care enough to donate ... Thank you, everybody that's here. Thank you, everybody that donated and are still donating. And I hope that donations don't stop with this," said Hill.
Hill was diagnosed with DIPG a little over a year ago and started raising funds through the Layup4Lauren challenge two months ago before she played in her first basketball game in college for the Mount St. Joseph University.
Because Hill's condition is quickly deteriorating, the NCAA granted her school a waiver that allowed the Division III basketball season to open two weeks early just so she could play. In her first game on Nov. 2, played against Hiram College, her team won 66-55, with Hill scoring the first and last basket.
Aside from the telethon, The Cure Starts Now raised money through auctions for No. 22 jerseys, a CSN campaign where holiday cards are sent with $22 and donations from Bengals' Andrew Whitworth, the Cleveland Cavaliers, the American Legion from Lawrenceburg, Indiana and Boys Hope Girls Hope Cincinnati.
DIPG is a brain tumor located in the pons, a part of the brain stem found close to the top of the spinal cord. It affects children primarily, with most diagnoses being made when a child is between five and seven years old. In a year, around 100 to 150 new cases of DIPG are diagnosed in the United States. Unfortunately, no more than 10 percent of children afflicted with DIPG live beyond two years of their diagnosis.
