The mum of a Glasgow girl diagnosed with a rare childhood cancer is desperately asking for help to get her the vital treatment she needs.

When Karen Szwedowski noticed her four-year-old daughter Amelia had an itchy eye, she put it down to her innocent times playing in the garden.

But on July 10 she was dealt the devastating news that her “life as a mother to my beautiful daughter Amelia changed forever”.

Her adorable girl was diagnosed with Rhabdomyosarcoma – an aggressive form of cancer that occurs in less than 60 children in the UK every year.

She now fears she may have to travel to Germany or even America to get the medical care she needs – so has set up a GoFundMe page to help cover the costs.

“My world just stopped dead that day,” explained Karen.

Glasgow Times: Karen Szwedowski was left 'broken' after Amelia's itchy eye turned out to be cancerKaren Szwedowski was left 'broken' after Amelia's itchy eye turned out to be cancer

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“When you hear stories of children and families, even relatives that have had this horrific news it does really hurt and it's a cliché but you always think it'll never happen to me - it's always someone else.

“But no-one is spared, no matter how young or old.

“It broke me as a mother to hear that my angel my best friend Amelia has been diagnosed with this horrible disease”.

Shortly after her diagnosis, Amelia started a nine-week course of chemotherapy – which Karen says took her “baby to a place no child should be”.

But the family were dealt another devastating blow – adding to their already difficult situation.

Following on from her chemo, Amelia needs radiotherapy every day for six weeks in order to make a full recovery.

For this particular treatment, the only available units are in Manchester, Germany and America – according to Karen.

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She explained: “It has been the hardest struggle and we thought we were almost at the end of this road

“It’s called direct proton therapy…due to the acuteness of my angel’s tumour and where it is positioned so close to the front lobe of her brain in her eye socket it has to be this sort of treatment unfortunately.

“This is why we as #TeamAmelia are asking for help.

“Scotland and the oncology wards do not cater for this treatment.

“We have been told we will have to travel to Manchester, Germany or America for this treatment.

“The NHS in the UK will pay for this this treatment, but our travel and stay and transport back and forth from wherever we have to go isn't.”

Karen says that the high demand of the machine in Manchester, which serves the whole of the UK, means they will likely need to turn to Germany or the US.

“As a parent I have nothing that means anything apart from my beautiful daughter,” the heartbroken mum added.

“This is why #TeamAmelia is now trying to raise funds for my daughter to be able to get the treatment she deserves and needs to get her back to being the life and soul of any event”.

 So far more than £16,000 has been raised in just one week – backed by 464 donors.

You can view the GoFundMe here.