"She's glad that the chemo proved less arduous than it sometimes can."
Josh Michtom
A Connecticut teen who refused chemotherapy to treat a curable cancer is now in remission. But her attorney said she's still fighting a court order that has her in the temporary custody of the state Department of Children and Families.
Cassandra C's attorney, Assistant Public Defender Joshua Michtom, said a recent medical scan shows no sign of Hodgkins Lymphoma in the girl.
"It's obviously good news," Michtom said. "Cassandra is happy about it. She's glad that the chemo proved less arduous than it sometimes can. She wants to finish up and get back to her regular life and she can't do that as long as she's in the hospital."
A court first placed the teen in DCF custody in December after she and her mother refused to follow medical advice to treat Cassandra's cancer which has an 85 percent survival rate. She appealed to the state Supreme Court which ultimately agreed with the lower court decision.
Now Cassandra has been in the hospital for almost four months, and Michtom said she should be able to go home and live with her mother again.
"The legal argument is that she's simply not in imminent risk of certain harm the way she was when she was one, saying she didn't want the treatment and two, it was agreed that without medical treatment she'd die for certain," Michtom said.
The attorneys for Cassandra and her mother will be back in court next week to argue that she be allowed to return home. In January, DCF had considered moving Cassandra into a group home while she continued receiving chemo but Michtom said that option did not work out.
DCF will no longer have custody of her when she turns 18 in September.
