An appeal for a Slade Green seven-year-old battling life-threatening cancer, has raised £177,000 in less than a week.

Funds began pouring in on Tuesday (November 11) for Frankie-Rose Lea, who was diagnosed with a brain tumour at the beginning of August.

The Haberdashers’ Aske’s pupil urgently needs a specialist form of radiotherapy to have the best chance of beating the cancer.

It has tripled in size since she began chemotherapy immediately following her diagnosis, and has also spread to her spine.

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The plan was to travel to the US for Frankie-Rose to undergo proton beam therapy – but the latest MRI scan results show she needs an operation to reduce swelling on the brain, meaning she can’t fly.

That hasn’t stopped a Dutch company from offering a free medical helicopter ride to ferry Frankie-Rose to Germany, where she may also be able to have treatment.

Mum Michelle, 36, who put the family’s terraced home in The Nursery, Slade Green, up for sale to raise funds before the donations started rolling in, said: “It’s been amazing but bittersweet.

“I don’t really know how to explain it – I’m shocked, I’m honoured, I’m grateful but they just all seem ridiculous words.

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With dad Sam Lea, 34.

“Life doesn’t get any worse and then you get a response like we’ve just had and you think it doesn’t get any better.”

A gofundme page was set up on November 11, and hit the initial £160,000 target for Frankie-Rose’s treatment in just four days.

The remaining funds will go to Tree of Hope, a charity supporting the families of other sick children requiring specialist medical treatment.

She could have conventional radiotherapy on the NHS, but it is not as effective as the more targeted proton beam method of shrinking the tumour.

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Frankie-Rose with her beads of courage, which document each stage of her treatment.

This means clinics in Germany or Switzerland will be her best bet as it will be a minimum of six weeks before Frankie-Rose could get treatment in this country – time she may not have.

Mother-of-three Michelle said: “I feel in my belly we are going to do this.

“We are going to get to next year and do whatever else we need to do.

“It’s just a rollercoaster of emotions at the moment.”