News

December 2 is Giving Tuesday, a global day dedicated to giving back to the community! It marks the start of this year’s Giving Season, where communities join forces and rally for favorite causes, giving back to those in need. Join the movement! VOBOC is participating in this year’s Giving Tuesday activities. We need your help to fulfill Last Requests from adolescents or young adults with cancer in palliative care. Unfortunately for some, this will be their last holiday season. Help make this holiday a special one for these young patients, by helping VOBOC fulfil a Last Request that will give them [...]

A 10-year old’s generous gift and its direct impact on adolescents and young adults with cancer For his 10th birthday Josh asked friends and family to give him money instead of gifts. He wasn’t planning to buy the latest video game, a season pass to La Ronde or a cool pair of running shoes.  Josh wanted to donate his birthday money to Venturing Out Beyond Our Cancer (VOBOC), a foundation that supports adolescents and young adults (AYA) with cancer.  Why would a 10-year old be so generous?  Well, Josh learned one of his elementary school teachers had cancer and he decided [...]

Last week, a medical team contacted us with a Special Request for a patient who had recently been airlifted to a Montreal hospital from the North Shore in Eastern Quebec due to complications with her cancer treatment. The medical team told us that she would have to remain in isolation in Montreal for an undetermined amount of time and was devastated that she would miss spending Christmas with her children. This morning, we were able to give her an iPad mini of her own so that she could Skype with her family back home and watch her children open the presents [...]

Last week, we received a special request for 17 year old patient who is facing an advanced cancer. As the holidays are approaching, she really wanted to do something special with her parents and 2 siblings and decided that going to see Cirque du Soleil with her family would be an incredible experience. Thanks to a generous donor, VOBOC was able to provide her with five tickets to go see the Cirque du Soleil’s Montreal show, Varekai, and the opportunity to create some wonderful memories with her family.

Recently, we received a special request for a patient who was in palliative care. He had been wanting to visit with his son but due to mobility issues, could not make the trip to his son’s home. His medical team got in touch with us, asking if we could arrange a medical transport for him. This past weekend, we were able to secure him an ambulance ride to and from his son’s home and ensure that he could have that special time with his family. Sometimes, the requests we receive are so simple yet they mean so much to the recipients. [...]

VOBOC recently received a special request from a music loving patient. Unfortunately, due to his chemotherapy treatments, his hearing has been affected and he has had to drop out of a music school because of this new heightened sensitivity to sound. There was however, a way to ensure that he could continue to pursue his passion of percussions: if he could get some quality, sound-minimizing headphones, he could continue to play without over burdening his ears. Headphones such as these are quite expensive and the patient’s hospital team came to VOBOC to ask if we could help. We got in touch [...]

This month, VOBOC was happy to have been able to grant a special request to a young couple wanting to celebrate their anniversary. The patient was in palliative care and, knowing that she did not have much time left, wanted to celebrate her wedding anniversary at the hotel where they held their wedding. VOBOC was privileged to have made this possible and we want to thank all our donors for helping us grant such a meaningful and touching request.