Lisa's Luna Pizza raising funds for Avon's Morgan Platt, Connecticut Brain Tumor Alliance

By BARBARA THOMAS (Star Patcher)

May is Brain Tumor Awareness Month and for the second year, Lisa’s Luna Pizza is raising money for Avon resident Morgan Platt, 11, and an organization that is raising awareness about the disease she is fighting.

Throughout May, the Simsbury pizza restaurant is selling stickers bearing a design created by Morgan that features a butterfly and the message “Be Strong, Be Positive.” The stickers sell for $1 and Lisa’s Luna Pizza matches each $1 with one of their own.
Half of the money raised goes to Morgan herself and the other half to the Connecticut Brain Tumor Alliance.

“The alliance helps patients, survivors and caregivers financially and emotionally, and also advocates for more funding and research,” said Kathy Platt, Morgan’s mom. “They have donated things like media glasses that children use to watch a movie while they’re having an MRI.”

“Morgan handles things so well for someone so young and I want to support her,” said Lisa Maurer of Avon, owner of Lisa’s Luna Pizza. “I met Kathy two years ago at a breast cancer fundraiser we had at Luna and last year, I decided to do something for brain tumor awareness. We raised close to $700.”

The sticker design also graces a ceiling tile on the oncology floor at Connecticut Children’s Medical Center (CCMC), where Morgan has been receiving treatment since June 2011. That’s when she was diagnosed with a brain tumor in her speech and language corridor. A biopsy taken during a six-hour surgery determined she has glioblastoma multiforme grade 4.

“It’s rare for children to have that type of tumor; it’s mostly seen in adults,” Platt said.

Over the past four years Morgan, who received media attention in November 2013 after filming a YouTube video at CCMC set to the Katy Perry song “Roar,” has had three surgeries, two sets of radiology treatments and ongoing chemotherapy, both oral and intravenous. Once a month, she has MRI imaging, which she is able to endure without sedation.

Morgan’s goal was for the video to go viral and that it would raise awareness of brain tumors and other diseases children at CCMC have. Nurses, physicians, other patients and parents played roles in the video. She chose the song “Roar” because it speaks about fighting, which is exactly what Morgan has been doing.

“She’s defied the odds,” Platt said “The video has had more than 200,000 hits, and we’re getting ready to shoot another video.”

As a mother, she of course wants to find a cure for her daughter’s cancer. She also has a son, first-grader Tyler, and the type of tumor Morgan has is known have a genetic link. There are more than 120 types of brain tumors.

“We need more awareness, funding and research before we can find a cure,” Platt said.

According to the National Cancer Institute, $4.79 billion was spent on cancer research in 2013, she said, and of that, only $185.1 million was for pediatric cancer research. Yet cancer is the leading cause of death by disease in children past infancy, with brain and central nervous system cancers at the top of the list.

Platt added that according to the American Brain Tumor Association, 700,000 people in the United States are currently living with a brain tumor, and it is estimated that 14,000 of them will lose their battle this year. That’s why awareness and funding is so important, she said.

Those who buy a sticker at Luna can help with that while also being inspired by the message “Be Strong, Be Positive.” The slogan was created for Morgan by the staff of Roaring Brook School when she was a student there. She is now a fifth-grader at Thompson Brook School in Avon.

Lisa’s Luna Pizza is located at 530 Bushy Hill Rd in Simsbury Commons. For information, call 860-651-1820.

To see the video, go to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbAFjZ-4ACU.