BRUNSWICK COUNTY, N.C. (WPDE) - Statistics show cancer in children and teenagers accounts for a very small margin of cancer cases in the United States. Angelina Hilos, 7, knows all too well what it's like to battle the disease.
Like most girls her age Angelina enjoys riding her bike, playing outside and taking pictures of herself. But beneath her smile she's fighting an adults battle. Last August she began going to Duke University Hospital in Durham for treatment.
Angelina explains what happened during some of those hospital visits over the course of eight months, "They had to put an IV in me, and then they had to hook up some stuff, then I had to wait and watched movies while I was doing it."
Within minutes of meeting Angelina you can't help but smile. Her lighthearted spirit is helping her grandmother, Wanda McElveen, cope with her latest bout with cancer. Angelina fell sick at three and had to have a kidney removed. She got better, but now she's fighting for her life once again.
"It's a Wilms tumor and it came back and so she lost her spleen, part of her pancreas and a piece of the colon through the surgery," says McElveen.
Surgeries, chemotherapy, and radiation are mixed in with trips to Mount Airy, NC also known as Mayberry. McElveen is hopeful Angelina will have many more birthdays beyond number seven.
"She's kept a real good spirit through the course of all of it and she's come through just a real trooper," she says. "She understands enough to know she's made the statement she never would want to have to go through it again."
The Make-a-Wish Foundation plans to send Angelina and her friends to Sea World this summer.
Next Saturday, June 23, John Whitty is hosting a golf tournament to help Angelina and her family. It starts at 9 a.m. at Palmetto Greens Golf and Country Club off highway 9 in Horry County. Sponsorships are available.
For more information on how you can participate Whitty can be reached at 843-222-3005. Donations can be mailed to 411 Charter Drive Longs, SC 29568.
