His parents understandably took their son to a dentist. The young boy was upset at the toothache. According to his mother Tracey, he “became upset” because he thought it was his fault as he had not brushed his teeth.

At the dentist, they concluded the young boy had some swelling in his teeth, probably caused by a tooth infection. But the swelling did not go down, in fact it began to grow.

When nothing seemed to work, and his swelling grew worse and worse, his parents rushed their upset child to a hospital. It was there they learned the devastating news; he had tumors on denhis brain and spine.

What was thought to be a tooth infection turned out to be a rare form of cancer called Rhabdomyosarcoma. The cancer is so rare that it only affects about 55 children in the UK every year.

The first warning signs of the diagnosis are swelling or lumps that can appear to grow on the body.

“Our world fell apart,” Ethan’s father, Mark said in an interview.

It was found that Ethan’s cancer had spread to his lungs and his bone marrow. Doctors decided to start an aggressive treatment plan involving chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

But after nine months of being in treatment, Ethan passed away at the age of just 9 years old.

After his passing, his parents were incredibly upset and called the treatment methods that had been used for his son as “embarrassing” and outdated. The grieving parents started a fundraiser in Ethan’s name to help fund research.

Mark, Ethan’s father, described the treatment methods as “embarrassing” and said they are extremely outdated. They set a goal of $62,000, out of which about half has already been achieved.

“We don’t want other families to have to go through what we’ve had to go through, it’s terrible,” Ethan’s family says.

After his passing, the issue of financing research on childhood cancer has come up in the parliament as well, which is a major step towards making sure more funds are appropriated to areas like this.

If you found this piece interesting, check out the one below, where a three-year-old passed away after dental procedures.