South Philly Review

Many advance the idea that one person’s loss is another’s gain. Elizabeth Cairo is working to prove that someone’s setback can simultaneously and paradoxically breed his or her own gain.

Since losing her sister, Lauren Fitzgerald, to brain cancer five years ago Sunday, Cairo, 32, has championed research efforts to lessen the prevalence of the frequently overlooked disease. Her involvement includes time as a committee member for the Race for Hope at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and as an overseer of Fitzy’s Halloween Festival and 5k Run/Walk in honor of her fallen sibling.

Cairo, of the 1700 block of Kater Street, has lived in South Philadelphia since 2006. She has become an advocate to address the devastation of brain and spinal cord tumors. Trailing only leukemia, those tumors account for nearly 21 percent of childhood cancers, according to The American Cancer Society. Each year, doctors diagnose more than 2,000 central nervous system tumors in children under the age of 20.

“Among children, brain cancer has almost become an epidemic,” Cairo said.

May, which is known National Brain Cancer Awareness Month, has proven a somewhat ironic period for Cairo and her immediate family. Ms. Fitzgerald received her diagnosis, a Grade 3 or “high grade” anaplastic oligodendroglioma on her sister’s birthday in May ’04.

At the time, Ms. Fitzgerald was a freshman interior design major at Drexel University. The Berks County 19-year-old belonged to the school’s crew team and its Delta Phi Epsilon sorority. She continued her schooling into her sophomore year following two surgeries at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Her tumor’s growth increased in May ’05, and her brave battle ended July 18 of that year at Duke University in Durham, N.C.

The end of Ms. Fitzgerald’s earthly existence impelled Cairo to maximize hers.

“I wanted to pursue a higher cause,” Cairo, who works as the director of business development for a local catering and event planning company, said.

Her commitment has yielded a spot on the 50-member committee for the annual Race for Hope.
“When we started, we were working out of someone’s basement,” she said.

Nearly 6,000 people participated in last year’s fundraiser for brain cancer, generating $750,000 for research, advocacy and patient services.

“We are aiming for $1 million this year,” Cairo said of the November 7 5k Run/Walk —  the fifth installment of her autumn contribution to raise local awareness.

A week prior to the run, she will join family and friends October 31 for Fitzy’s Run/Walk. The Wyomissing gathering, which annually convenes on the last Sunday in October, falls this year on what would have been Ms. Fitzgerald’s 26th birthday. Since the inaugural year of her passing, proceeds from the event have gone towards starting scholarship funds for Berks County high school seniors and charitablefunds, with donations going to the American Brain Tumor Association. Local families that have lost children to cancer and brain tumors also have benefitted.

“Each year these events truly amaze me,” Cairo said. “Outsiders may wonder, with the high fatality rate, why anybody bothers with these types of events. Those people have given up hope. The people who struggle with the disease don’t give up hope.”

Doctors diagnosed Ms. Fitzgerald with a primary brain tumor. This tumor originates within the brain, whereas a secondary brain tumor is one that has spread, or metastisized, to another area of the body. Approximately 17,000 primary brain tumor diagnoses happen each year, with nearly 13,000 resulting in death, a 76 percent fatality rate. accoding to the American Cancer Socirty. Secondary brain cancer cases number 100,000 each year . 

Ms. Fitzgerald, however, is much more than a statistic to her sister.

“Lauren’s fight is a testament to her being young and having fight,” Cairo said of Ms. Fitzgerald, whose heart, lungs, kidneys and liver have maintained the lives of five fortunate people.

Brain cancer has numerous signs and symptoms, including blurred vision, which tipped off Ms. Fitzgerald’s family to the fact that their loved one was sick. Losing her sister has encouraged Cairo to promote healthy lifestyles for herself; her fiance, Joaquin Koenig; and their 1-year-old son, Loren, whose name is the masculine twist on his late aunt’s.

“I am raising my son vegan,” Cairo, who became engaged in May and will soon begin a new life in Fishtown, said. She and Koenig have planned September ’11 nuptials.

As further proof of her commitment to health and longevity, she wants specialists to construct more trials for treatment options for brain cancer patients, noting chemotherapy and drugs as her chief concerns. She desires for more involvement in hospitals and has advocated added outreach to doctors, suggesting that the Race for Hope honor oncologists who have tirelessly sought answers.