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Catching childhood eye cancer early: Calgary mom shares her story

Click to play video: 'Get your baby checked, says mom of little girl fighting eye cancer'
Get your baby checked, says mom of little girl fighting eye cancer
WATCH ABOVE: A Calgary mom is strongly urging all parents to take their little ones for an eye exam, starting when they're babies. Her own daughter was born with a rare kind of childhood eye cancer, but it wasn't caught until she was nearly two. As Mia Sosiak reports, the signs were there all along, had she known how to spot them – Sep 15, 2016

A Calgary mother is strongly urging all parents to take their little ones for an eye exam, starting when they’re babies, in light of her own daughter’s health battle.

Three-year-old Dallis Delarge was born with a rare childhood eye cancer called retinoblastoma, but it wasn’t caught until she was nearly two.

READ MORE: Community rallies to help Alberta couple battling cancer achieve one last dream

During an eye exam, optometrist Jared Long spotted a tumour behind the girl’s eye. She was just shy of her second birthday.

Since then, the little girl has endured six rounds of chemotherapy. She has to fly with one of her parents to Toronto SickKids Hospital every six to eight weeks, for laser and local cryotherapy on the 13 tiny tumours she still has.

Her family struggles most with the fact her treatment could have been started sooner.

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“Just knowing that cancer was there and I don’t know,” said Chantal Delarge. “I look back at all her pictures and I think, ‘oh my gosh, that could have been really bad if we didn’t catch it when we did.'”

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She now knows you can actually see eye tumours in flash photos. They appear as a milky white spot. In baby photos of Dallis, that spot is obvious.

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WATCH: Kids with Cancer Society on meeting the needs of the entire family 
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Kids with Cancer Society on meeting the needs of the entire family

Now, Delarge is urging other parents to learn from her experience: if you see irregularities in a child’s photo, they need immediate medical attention.

Dallis is now a busy preschooler, though she is experiencing a bit of developmental delay either from the disease or her treatment.

READ MORE: Saskatoon family touched by childhood cancer urge residents to roll up sleeves

Her tumours are stable, and she is carefully watched for any signs her cancer has spread.

There is a greater risk of that as she gets older.

It’s recommended that children have their eyes examined starting at the age of six months and every year after until the age of 19. In Alberta the exams are covered by Alberta Health.

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