A grandad who was diagnosed with lung cancer last Christmas feels like the "luckiest guy in the world" a year on.
Gordon Darnell, 69, from Croxteth, was invited to a regulation lung health scan in November 2021. He had no symptoms and was not feeling unwell, but attended anyway.
However, the scan led to further tests and Gordon was diagnosed with lung cancer on Christmas Eve 2021. It turned his Christmas into a "nightmare".
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Just a month later, after an operation, Gordon was effectively cured. He didn't have to go through chemotherapy because the cancer was caught so early, thanks to the lung check.
Now, a year on from his diagnosis, a healthy Gordon is looking forward to spending Christmas with his wife Muriel Darnell, 69, and their grandchildren. His consultant told him this would not have been possible if he did not attend his initial scan.
Gordon told the ECHO : "We got a letter in November 2021 asking us to contact somebody to see if we were eligible to get a lung scan. I went through a questionnaire and after that it said I was welcome to have the scan.
"I thought about it for a minute or two because I felt well. But then I thought I should go for the lung scan because it was an insurance policy. If there’s nothing wrong with me and I go and they say there’s nothing wrong with me, then I’ve lost nothing."
Gordon attended the scan, but he was then asked to come to hospital back for more tests. As the omicron Covid-19 variant was prominent at the time, he said he had to take covid tests and then isolate before entering hospitals.
After an X-ray and a biopsy at Liverpool Heart & Chest Hospital, Gordon was sent to the nuclear medicine department at the Royal Liverpool Hospital for further scans. Many cancer scans use mildly radioactive substances to highlight areas where cells are more active than normal. This led to Gordon and Muriel turning to humour in what was a testing time.
He explained: " I went down there and they put some nuclear thing in my body, which would make me mildly radioactive for some hours so the scan worked better, it seems.
" Obviously when things are going wrong, you turn to humour. When I came back and told my wife that I was going to be radioactive, she said ‘if we’re going to bed tonight and you’re glowing in the dark, you’re going into the other room'."
These scans led to Gordon's diagnosis. He said: "Th ey contacted me again and asked me to come down and speak to them, that was going to be on Christmas Eve last year.
" They said, ‘when we’re speaking to people like this, we always do it on the Friday, but because it’s Christmas Eve, you might want to delay this’. But I said, ‘no, I’ll come down and speak to you. If there’s something not right, let’s put it right, that’s just the way it’s got to be.'
" I thought there was something wrong at their end, because I felt well enough to think that I didn’t have any problem with cancer. Then they rang me up on December 23, they said you might want to consider bringing your wife or somebody with you. That’s when the alarm bells first started going off with me."
A senior consultant told Gordon he had stage one lung cancer and showed him an X-ray. However, Gordon said that the consultant told him: "You saved your own life the way you went for the first scan", because the cancer had been caught so early, before adding: "If we didn’t know about you, you wouldn’t be here in 12 months’ time, you’d be gone".
Gordon had to return to hospital a month later. He had an operation on January 25 and was kept in hospital for two days.
Because Gordon didn't need chemo, he was placed on a five-year plan for monitoring. Eight weeks after the operation, Gordon was able to go on holiday to Spain and a year on, he is healthy - despite occasionally feeling some pain.
He said: "When you’ve had lung cancer, it still takes a bite out of you. I’ve spoken to the consultant that my chest gets very tight and I can find it difficult to breathe and walk.
"He said that happens quite regularly to some patients and they can’t do anything about that. But it’s a better option than not having the operation."
Gordon is incredibly thankful that he went to his initial scan and recommends that others do so when invited. He said he feels like the "luckiest guy in the world" because the cancer was found so early and was treatable.
After a real scare last year, he is "really looking forward to this Christmas", as his two granddaughters will be coming to stay.
Gordon said: "Last year was a nightmare, as you would imagine. But I’m really looking forward to seeing family and friends this year.
"If I hadn’t gone for that test, I wouldn’t be meeting anybody and that’s why I’d urge anyone who is invited to one, to go. Even if you feel well, just take the test. It won’t take more than an hour even with travel, you’re only there for 10 minutes for the first scan."
The initial lung check which Gordon credits with saving his life is currently being rolled out further in Merseyside. NHS England's Targeted Lung Health Check programme invites people aged 55 to 74 to have a free lung health check.
The checks have been running in Liverpool, Knowsley and Halton for 18 months and within the Merseyside and Cheshire region, they have identified over 100 lung cancers so far. This has enabled 74 people diagnosed with early-stage lung cancer to receive curative treatment.
People in St Helens and south Sefton will soon be invited to checks. The first residents in St Helens to receive their invitations live in Parr, Bold and Sutton. It will then gradually roll out across the borough including Newton, Earlestown in March 2023, Moss Bank, Rainford, Windle, Eccleston, West Park, Thatto Heath and Rainhill in July 2023 and Haydock, Billinge and Seneley Green in December next year.
Litherland, Seaforth and Bootle are the first areas of south Sefton to be targeted, beginning this month, before people in Crosby and Waterloo are invited in May 2023 and Maghull in September.
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