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Photograph by Skye Dunlap
One Boy's Life
Richie Ang fights an inoperable brain tumor, with help from friends--human and dinosaur
By Genevieve Roja
Richie Ang is lost in dinosaur-land when I arrive at his house. The 6-year-old son of Letty Quizon and Richard Ang, dressed in green sweatpants and plaid shirt, is sprawled stomach-down on the soft tan couch watching Barney on television and playing with his mini-collection of dinos.
"This is my favorite," he says, holding up a plastic figurine that resembles a rhino. "It's a Chasmasaurus; a four-legged dinosaur with one horn and has a frill with many spikes."
He chatters on about his dinosaurs from the Jurassic period; the omnivores and carnivores, the two-winged to the hind-legged. I'm still working on how to spell "Chasmasaurus." Quizon, dressed in a sweatshirt, jeans and black thongs, comes in and tells me to excuse the boxes. They've just moved from their home in Cupertino to this temporary spot on Budd Avenue in Campbell, which would explain the smell of fresh paint and waxed floors.
On any other given day Quizon says she would be working in the office, where she and her husband do marketing consulting for Dairy Belle, an establishment similar to Dairy Queen. Instead, she's taking care of Richie, who's undergoing chemotherapy to treat the benign, inoperable tumor lodged in his brain.
The ordeal began as a simple eye exam. Quizon had taken Richie to see the pediatrician for his annual exam when it was discovered he had decreased vision in his right eye. The optometrist referred her to an opthalmologist, who said she didn't see anything wrong "as far as glasses were concerned," says Quizon.
"She found out that his eyes were healthy," Quizon says. "She thought there was something going on behind the eye."
The opthalmologist recommended that Richie get an MRI (magnetic resonance imaging). The first week of June, Richie was diagnosed with low-grade astro-cytoma, a non-cancerous--and, thankfully benign--slow-growth tumor, that measured one and a half inches.
After two doctor referrals, the family settled on Dr. Mike Edwards, a specialist in pediatric neurosurgery with a practice in Sacramento. Edwards ordered a biopsy, leaving a temporary bald spot on the right side of Richie's head. Two weeks later, Richie was suffering from pounding headaches, high fevers and vomiting at least eight times a day. Doctors were puzzled. So they saw Dr. Edwards again, and Richie's parents were told that the tumor was blocking fluid in the brain.
"It was causing pressure, causing the ventricles to swell," Quizon says.
Dr. Edwards inserted into Richie's head a shunt, a very fine plastic tube that ran from his brain to his abdomen and re-circulated fluid, distributing it evenly throughout his body. Richie's tumor is inoperable because it is lodged close to the hypothalamus, which controls body temperature, blood pressure, heartbeat and other critical functions.
Drawing by Richie Ang
On July 2, Richie went through his first successful chemotherapy session, and will brave another one Aug. 4.
"We went out to lunch in Sacramento, and he ate crispy pata [a traditional Filipino dish of fat-fried pork shanks] and a whole plate of rice," says Quizon, who moved with her family from the Philippines to New Jersey and then to California in 1996. "It was a good sign."
Richie's blood count--which usually drops 14 days after a chemotherapy session--was up and normal, and he was doing everyday kid things such as reading and going to John D. Morgan Park with friends. The family was happy, Quizon says. "Our prayers were answered."
Then the Angs panicked. Their insurance carrier, Blue Cross of California, refused to make medical payments on the basis that Richie's illness was a "pre-existing" condition. Blue Cross claimed the Quizon knew about Richie's condition before she applied for insurance.
"I knew he was healthy, so I applied for the highest co-pay and monthly premium," Letty says. "If I knew he had cancer, I would've chosen the lowest co-pay."
But Blue Cross relented (perhaps because of all the media coverage, Quizon says), and decided to continue to pay for Richie's treatments, which will run anywhere from $250,000 to $1 million. That doesn't include the time and money spent on trips to Sutter Memorial Hospital in Sacramento, where Richie will have one monthly chemo session for the next year.
Doctors will determine after a year whether or not Richie will need radiation. However, radiation may have permanent side effects, such as learning disabilities, as Richie matures. The side effects of chemotherapy are only temporary.
"The doctors are holding off on radiation 'til he gets big enough," Quizon says. "They're hoping to stabilize the tumor and shrink it to buy some time. If it becomes smaller in size, the less radiation you have."
On the outside, Richie looks like any ordinary 6-year-old, except for his long legs and arms--so thin his bones almost protrude from beneath his skin. He also wears a portacatheter so doctors can access his central line, instead of poking him, which Richie abhors. Although chemotherapy can suppress appetite, Richie is still eating his favorite traditional Filipino foods, such as lumpia (a Filipino eggroll stuffed with ground pork), sinigang (ribs with a tamarind, stew-like marinade), and kare-kare, which Richie pronounces as "curry-curry," a dish of oxtails in peanut butter sauce and string beans.
Photograph by Skye Dunlap
Pun Loving: Richie Ang shares a joke with his mother, Letty Quizon.
Richie loves horses, whales, elephants, his Beanie Baby collection (donated by several kind hearts) and his action toys and figurines. Quizon says she can't get him to give them up or donate them because Richie has mentally catalogued each one. It's just one of many feats by Richie, who also creates his own jokes, dubbed "originals." (Q. What do you call a bad monkey? A. A bad-boon).
Richie learned to read at age 3, and enrolled in the International Center for Beginning Beginners in the Philippines at age 1 1/2.
"His thing is alphabets," says Quizon, who also mentions Richie was reading at the first-grade level last year as a kindergartner. She says Richie was counting at 1 1/2, amazing his teachers, who suspected he was gifted. His memory for detail is remarkable as well, and Quizon says her son has a prodigious vocabulary, "almost adult-level."
To help Richie's cause, Christa McAuliffe School in Saratoga, where Richie will be a first grader this fall--he got a special waiver to attend the school even though he now lives in Campbell--held a "Get Well Richie Ang Day" June 19. The school raised $6,000 with proceeds from a car wash, bake sale, flea market and silent auction. The school also initiated the Richie Ang Fund at the Saratoga National Bank, which to date totals $10,000.
"We always feel so thankful and so blessed that we are part of this community," Letty Quizon says. "Although Richie's condition can really make us worried sometimes, the support of the community has encouraged us to be positive and to look forward and be optimistic."
To make a donation to the Angs, Saratoga National Bank has set up the Richie Ang Special Needs Trust Fund; the account number is 003-431789. Saratoga National Bank can be reached at 973-1111.
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Campbell, California
