A young woman was given a heart breaking diagnosis after six months of back pain and night sweats turned out to be symptoms of an aggressive form of cancer. Hannah Bird, 24 'went to the doctors three to four times a week' after she lost weight, had rashes and continuous coughing along with back and chest pain but she was repeatedly dismissed.
When she was eventually given an X-ray and a scan, she was diagnosed with Diffuse large B cell lymphoma just weeks after getting engaged to her partner, Wales Online reports. The travel content creator from Bristol said that the devastating news of her cancer did not come as a 'shock' to her and that she was 'relieved' to finally have a diagnosis.
Hannah is thankfully now cancer-free and is completing a tour of bucket list destinations with her fiancé after their engagement plans and countless holidays were 'destroyed' while she battled the disease. The 24-year-old who is 'the only person in the UK to have all of their non-Hodgkin's cancer gone with chemotherapy alone' is now urging people to get a second opinion if they're not satisfied with their doctor's diagnosis.
Hannah said: "You know it is bad when they ask for someone to come sit with you while the doctors give you the news. It wasn't a shock - I was relieved to finally have a diagnosis. It didn't hit me until I started chemotherapy.
"I was more devastated that I couldn't travel; we had so many plans. We were looking to buy a house but financially we were screwed. Our lives were destroyed for a year."
Hannah had been experiencing night sweats, rashes, continuous coughing and was losing weight for six months. She was on holiday in Paris with her boyfriend Charlie Camper, 23, a professional golfer when he proposed to her but the 24-year-old was so unwell she couldn't enjoy the moment.
Hannah said: "I felt so bad that day, I slept for most of it. Our engagement plans got destroyed by my diagnosis. We didn't have a normal engagement experience."
In March 2022 Hannah was away skiing when she started suffering from back and chest pain and later caught pneumonia. The doctors gave Hannah an x-ray and a CT scan and the following day she was told she had cancer.
Hannah said: "The tumour was in my left lung - it took up three-quarters of my lung. We found out I was stage four. I was so relieved that they found out what was wrong with me."
Initially doctors believed Hannah was suffering from lung cancer but after a biopsy three weeks later she was diagnosed with Diffuse large B cell lymphoma - the most common subtype of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Hannah was accepted onto a clinical trial where she was given immunotherapy, a non-chemo-invasive drug which works by helping the immune system recognise and attack cancer cells.
She said: "At my halfway scan my tumour had shrunk by 80%. By September 2022, I had finished chemotherapy all the cancer was gone, which was not normal. I am the only person in the UK to have all of their non-Hodgkin's cancer gone with chemotherapy alone."
Hannah was given the go ahead to travel again in October 2022 and has CT scans every 12 weeks to check for any signs of cancer. After not being able to travel for a year, Hannah and her fiancé who are set to marry in September are making up for lost time with their travel bucket list.
Hannah said: "My partner said I can have a bucket list trip once I have finished my immunotherapy, another one once I had finished my chemotherapy and then another one when I got the all-clear. The first trip we went to Turkey, it was absolutely amazing, and then the second trip we went on was to the Arctic Circle in January.
"It is possible to have your bucket list, you can travel while going through treatment - you just have to plan ahead and make sure you are close to hospitals if things go wrong." The couple are going to the Philippines in May and then to Antarctica for their honeymoon in January 2024.
Advising others with cancer symptoms, Hannah said: "Get a second opinion, I went to the same doctor every single time, I think if I had gone to a different doctor I would have been diagnosed a lot sooner. I went to the doctor three to four times a week - I was so desperate. If you think that something is wrong, request a referral or second opinion by another doctor."
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