A Scot is desperately trying to raise money for drugs to save her life as she battles stage four lung cancer.
Angi Lamb was diagnosed with small cell lung cancer in November after repeatedly being told by her GP that she had a virus.
She will never know if those vital missed weeks could have prevented her cancer becoming so advanced but she is certain she would not have suffered a paralysed vocal cord, which affects her speech, if it had been caught earlier.
She has had chemotherapy and radiotherapy but the only hope she has of extending her life is with the drug Keytruda.
It is not yet licensed for small cell use in the UK and clinical trials are still ongoing into its effectiveness. It is already a prescribed medicine for non small cell lung cancer but efficacy has still to be established for the other use in this country.
However, it has been proven to be effective in the United States where the Federal Drug Agency approved it for small cell use a year ago. For more than half of the patients on a trial in the US- their lives were extended by 18 months or more.
For Angi, a retired IT consultant at Edinburgh University, her only option is to pay for the drug herself through a private hospital.
Angi, 63, said: “I had been going to the doctor since the end of September but he kept telling me I had a virus. Eventually I asked for an x-ray and then everything moved pretty quickly after that.”
She was diagnosed with cancer in her left lung which had metastasised to her liver. Removing the lung wasn’t an option so all she could have was emergency palliative chemotherapy.
She had six rounds of chemotherapy and then a series of radiotherapy sessions.
Angi doesn’t know how much time she has left. She hasn’t asked.
She explained: “It depresses me too much. But I know the survival rate after five years is about six per cent.”
Her friend Martin Belk said: “GPs need to be more vigilant. I watched Angi get ill and if she hadn’t insisted on an x-ray when she did her outcome could have been very different.
“The x-ray technician sent her to the Western General straight away and they told her there if she hadn’t come in she would have been dead in three days.
“If we had known earlier they could have saved her voice. She has been whispering for months now.”
Although small cell cancer accounts for around 15 per cent of lung cancers Angi said there have been no real breakthroughs in treatment terms for around 20 years and with such a life limiting condition she cannot afford to wait.
Her oncologist told her about Keytruda but said it would only be available to her on private prescription at a private hospital. And last week she travelled to Glasgow to have the first session.
It costs £12,800 per six week treatment block but if she reacts well to is she is hopeful the drug company may step in to provide it on compassionate grounds.
She said: “I heard about the success of trials in American from my brother who works in California so I thought it was worth looking at.
“It is all about trying to buy some time.
“In one case a patient had just three treatments and couldn’t tolerate any more but they are still here four years later.”
Angi summed up her feelings: “I am not afraid of death, I just don’t want to hurtle towards it.
“I look for positive outcomes and I never want to give up. I am very determined.
“But there has been so little treatment for many years for lung cancer compared to other cancers. There needs to be more focus put on lung cancer.”
Martin has started a gofundme page to raise money for the drug.
He said: “Angi is very well liked in her community so I am hoping they will rally round. We have raised enough for the first round of treatment and we are looking at things like equity release from her house but we need help.
“Time is of the essence. We don’t have months and months and months to wait. We are in the middle of a delicate chess game.”
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