Ken Hudson Campbell, who portrayed Santa in Home Alone, raised money via crowdfunding to pay for his cancer surgery after losing his SAG-AFTRA health insurance.
A GoFundMe page was set up by Campbell’s daughter, Michaela, in advance of his planned “10-hour surgery” on Dec. 7. In October, Campbell’s daughter, Michaela, wrote in the crowdfunding page description that”a tumor had elusively grown on the bottom of his mouth and it began encroaching on his teeth.”
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His daughter told PEOPLE that Campbell was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma, which is not typically a life-threatening form of skin cancer but can spread across other parts of the body if left untreated, according to Mayo Clinic. With top donations from celebrities like Steve Carell, Yeardley Smith, and “Big Bang Theory” co-creator Bill Prady, his surgery fundraiser exceeded its $100,000 goal.
Later, Campbell’s daughter revealed that his “cancer was removed successfully, and his jaw bone has been reconstructed from his fibula and attached.”
“The day after surgery, they took him off the respirator. He is in very good condition. He’s giving us hand signals at times, writing his thoughts down and trying his hardest to communicate with us, even though he cannot speak,” she added. “He’s been making small improvements in different ways as each day goes by.”
As part of the surgery, the surgeon was planning to remove “a large part of his jawbone” as well as “his lymph nodes and part of his leg bone.”
“Surgeons plan to reconstruct a new jaw for Ken from this leg bone, install it, and treat him with radiation. He will have a 6-month recovery period & Chemo may be needed afterwards as well,” his daughter wrote.
She continued, “Even though physical therapy and speech therapy are covered, we are anticipating huge out-of-pocket costs for caregivers/skilled nursing, insurance premiums, medical equipment, transportation, dental implants, dentures and who knows what else.”
Campbell was getting routine checkups up until January when he lost health insurance. His cancer then became more aggressive, his daughter told PEOPLE.
“He lost his health insurance with SAG and he had to stop going to the same doctors that he had been going to for a while about his mouth. And it discouraged him a little bit and he just didn’t really check on it,” she said. “I think it was really shocking for us because we thought he was taking care of it, at least I did. It was really hard for me to hear and I had a hard time emotionally.”
Regarding his next project, Campbell is slated to voice a character named Boomer in the Paramount+ series Adventures in Wonder Park due out in 2024.
