I found out a few days ago that my fiance's mother was told by her doctor that if she does not get some form of laser surgery on her lung cancer, she will not live to see 2009.

At most, the surgery has a 10-25% chance of extending her life for up to five years. But it's something.

The surgery was going to cost her $200,000 with her insurance--she put in the paper work for the insurance, the insurance company called the mortgage company to put a lien on their house and the mortgage company called Donna to let her know they were foreclosing on the house.

Now, I've found a bunch of programs that may help them keep their house, but I have yet to find a single program that will help with the medical cost of the surgery.

I've contacted NCA, NCI as well as my local Red Cross and NCA branch, but I'm not even sure how much information I'll be able to get or how long it will take.

At this point I'm just posting around everywhere--here, cancer support forums, etc--looking for suggestions, information, ideas, in regards to programs that help pay for cancer surgeries or medical treatment in general.

I've been looking fruitlessly ever since and I just don't know where to throw my net.

I realize this may not be the best of places to look--but you never know. No stone left unturned, right?

Edit: FYI, we are in Connecticut, USA

Well when Bobby and Dani were really really ill they had to go to America for a treatment that only had a 15% chance survival rate. There were NO funds to help the girls. Not a one....So we did the only thing we could...Raised the money ourselves... Of course the treatment failed and killed one girl so their parents spent the rest making the other girls last days happy.

But the point is... we raised the money and perhaps that's the only thing you can do.

Here's what we did:
Appealed on Television
Sponsered walks
Sponsered runs

We arranged a lot of other sponsered events, but those three we did the most. We raised all the money we needed. Their entire family plus the entire family of their families friends, plus their friends all got involved. Raised awareness, money, support...

Use your imagination and try to raise some of the money yourself. Get your friends involved, people you work with, your comunity. You'd be suprised at how people band together to help.

I wanted to first go through official programs and then reach out to the community for whatever was left.

Or do both at the same time.

I'm not sure how quickly I'll need to raise funds, what sort of a window I have to work with. She's already in stage IIIA or IIIB (I can't remember which) lymphoma and she was given up to a year.

If I were you I'd fundraise as much as possable. If you wait to fundraise until you find a charity it may be too late. My advise is do what you can while you can. And you should probably give a location if you want Charity names because I can gurantee you England and America have different charities for example.

I edited my first post to include our location.

Thank you for your suggestions and encouragement. It really does help to know that people have been able to rally a community around a cause like this. I'm really hesitant to reach out like that because I don't know what sort of response it will get.

I agree on the fundraising but how do you do that legally? I mean don't you have to worry about taxes and registrating a name and stuffs like that? I suggest a support group for your family to go to as they will come up with ideas that you will be able to work through. I really hope that things work out for you and your family