Children Cancer Stories by Rukh Yusuf - Blog # 221
I am Rukh Yusuf, Clinical Pharmacist, also specialized in Total Parenteral Nutrition and Bone Marrow Transplant. I have been working in the Pediatric Oncology unit of a public hospital for several years. The mission of this blog is to bring to you the real-life stories of child patients suffering from cancer. Cancer is still a difficult disease to handle and treat. However, when it strikes the children, some so young that they cannot even speak, their agony is beyond expression and words. Let us pray especially for children suffering from cancer for early and complete remission. May Allah shower His Merciful Blessings upon them. Aameen.
I first met Faizan in early 2021. He was nine years old then—a quiet boy with deep, serious eyes. His chart read B-cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL), newly diagnosed. He had just been admitted for induction chemotherapy. Like many young patients, Faizan didn’t ask questions. He sat beside his mother, holding her hand, trying to make sense of the strange hospital world around him.
Faizan is from Arifwala, a small town that’s few hours away from the cancer center. His family traveled here on borrowed time and borrowed money, trusting strangers in white coats to help their child. I remember his father sitting outside the pharmacy, trying to understand what PEG-asparaginase was, why he had to find it outside, and whether a cheaper brand would “work the same.” As a pharmacist, these are common conversations. But in Faizan’s case, I remember his father didn’t ask too many questions. He only asked, “Will this make him better?”
Treatment began. Vincristine, steroids, intrathecal methotrexate—all laid out in protocols with complicated names, but each dose marking a step toward hope. And Faizan responded well. By the end of 2021, he was in remission. His blood counts normalized. His hair began to grow back. There was laughter in the ward again—careful, cautious laughter.
In 2022, he celebrated his remission. He rang the little bell we keep in the pediatric oncology wing. I remember thinking how different he looked—still small for his age, but louder now, curious about the IV pumps and asking me why medicine sometimes “burns the vein.” He said he wanted to become a “doctor or a pharmacist” when he grew up—he hadn’t decided exactly.
But then, in late 2022, the blood counts started to shift again. I remember seeing him in OPD one morning and feeling the weight of numbers I wish had stayed stable. Flow cytometry confirmed it—relapse. The disease was back. The pharmacy team got the order for reinduction, and we started the process all over again. The same meds. The same nausea. This time, he didn't ask as questions.
Now, Faizan is 11. He’s in the second year of treatment again, and he’s tired. His ANC drops often. He misses a lot of school. Sometimes he forgets words. His mother says he used to be good at math but now struggles. Some days he sleeps through most of his visits; other days, he watches cartoons on a donated tablet while the infusion runs. He rarely complains. But I notice the subtle changes—he no longer flinches when the IV line is flushed. He can name most of his chemotherapy medications now. And he doesn’t ask when treatment will end anymore.
As a pharmacist, my role is critical. I review doses, adjust for organ function, manage side effects. But in practice, pediatric oncology care goes far beyond pharmacokinetics. You remember faces. You memorize schedules. You carry quiet pieces of their stories with you. And with Faizan, I carry the image of a child who never got to stop being a patient.
Faizan’s story isn’t over yet. He’s still in treatment, and he still travels with his family from Arifwala for every cycle. His parents still ask careful questions, and I still do my best to answer them in plain language. He still wears the same worn blue slippers during his visits. I don’t know what the outcome will be—but I know Faizan is more than his lab values. He’s a boy who once wanted to be a “medicine person,” and maybe one day, if life allows, he still could.
For now, he remains under our care—between pharmacy doses and doctor rounds, between uncertainty and the quiet hope we don’t always speak out loud.
If you're reading this, I ask only one thing—remember Faizan in your prayers. Not as a statistic or a case report, but as a real 11-year-old boy who wants to be a health care provider. His story matters.
Prayers for the Faizan and all the sick children and their families who have to face this pain of cancer. May Allah make it easy for them. Aameen
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