CLOSER NEWS REPORT
People with a cancerous brain tumour generally see a doctor five times before diagnosis. For Brain Tumour Awareness Month, Closer looks at why they aren’t taken more seriously…
When Laura Nuttall complained about a series of terrible headaches which left her bed bound, her sister Gracie was worried and, in October 2018, along with her mum Nicola, she travelled from their home in Lancashire to where Laura lived in London.
When they got there, they found her pale, sweaty and uncontrollably vomiting. Gracie says, “As Laura was at uni, my parents thought she had Fresher’s Flu or a bad hangover, but she wasn’t really a party animal. Maybe it was sister intuition but I knew she needed help, so I persuaded Mum to go and see her.
SURGERY
“When we saw how desperately ill she was, we called an ambulance and she was rushed to Homerton University Hospital, where she was given painkillers and a CT scan. When doctors revealed the cause of Laura’s headaches, it was like a bomb blast through our world. Laura had six brain tumours.”
At first doctors thought they were benign, but one the size of a golf ball was pressing on the lining of her brain, causing the headaches. Laura had five hours of life-saving surgery. A biopsy revealed worse news: the tumour was a glioblastoma, a fast-growing cancer. Gracie says, “She was given just a year to live. We were stunned. It was devastating.”
Every year, around 12,000 people in the UK are, like Laura, diagnosed with a brain tumour. There are over 130 types and they can be cancerous or non-cancerous.
Catherine Fraher, from The Brain Tumour Charity, says, “The most common symptoms of a brain tumour in adults and children are headaches with no known cause, nausea and changes in vision. If any of these symptoms are persistent or you have a combination of them, don’t brush them off, get checked out.”
Worryingly, many people with a brain tumour are diagnosed late. More than a third of people with cancerous brain tumours are diagnosed at A&E. One in three people surveyed by The Brain Tumour Charity visited a medical professional more than five times before they were diagnosed.
The charity says this is because symptoms are often similar to other less serious conditions, so people and medical professionals don’t follow them up. The bones of the skull can also make it hard to detect tumours. In most cases, they can only be diagnosed through scans and biopsies and as these can be costly, medical professionals may avoid doing these unless there is a strong likelihood of a brain tumour.
SYMPTOMS
This month, Brain Tumour Awareness Month, the charity launched its “No Brainer” campaign. Thirty-four people – representing the numbers diagnosed with a b
