A “devastated” mum has told how her toddler is now paralysed after his cancer was missed 15 times by doctors over a three month period, it is reported.
Ollie Knowles was taken back and forth to the doctors by mum Sarah, 34, but each time his screaming was put down to constipation or colic.
And when his aggressive cancer was discovered it had already spread to his spine causing paralysis from the waist down - which could have been avoided if it was caught earlier.
Sarah and her husband, 34, from Leigh, Lancashire has said Covid was being blamed as it meant people were unable to go to the doctor’s surgery.
Ollie first appeared to have a swollen stomach in July last year but they were only able to get a phone consultation.
"They said that it was because of Covid, that a lot of the appointments were over the phone as we weren’t allowed to go to the surgery. We have received counselling to deal with our anger about it, and we are just trying to look top the future, Sarah told The Sun.
"But if he had been seen earlier, then it would have been caught before it had spread to his spine and paralysed him."
Sarah said that she knew there was more to it than constipation as he was in so much pain and now knows it was because the “tumour was pressing on his stomach.”
Over the coming three months, Ollie had 15 doctor consultations but the cancer was missed.
Then one morning he tried to stand up but fell to the ground as he had “lost feeling and sensation in his legs”.
In hospital he was found to have an agressive neuroblastoma cancer which was the size of an apple in his stomach and had spread to his spine.
Sarah said: “It was devastating news. We couldn’t believe what we were being told. After all this time, he had been crying because the tumour had been causing him so much pain.”
Despite suffering infections from the chemotherapy he received at Manchester Children’s Hospital, it has been successful in shrinking the tumour but so far he remains paralysed and his parents don’t know if he will be able to walk again.
