A six-year-old who was left radioactive after undergoing cancer treatment was forced to separate from her brother for over a month.
Poppy Bailey was injected with a pioneering drug to kill rare cells in her body, known as neuroblastoma.
However side effects from the clinical trial left her radioactive - meaning she was unable to hug her parents, grandparents, or 18-month-old brother Oscar.
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Poppy, who is obsessed with Disney princesses, became a big sister to Oscar in April 2020, around the same time she started feeling pain in her leg.
At four-years-old, she began experiencing feelings of tiredness, she had lost her appetite and became clingy and depressed, which her parents initially put down to her being upset at not seeing her schoolfriends due to Covid-19.
After a trip to her local hospital, an X-ray revealed that Poppy was suffering from a large tumour that was wrapped around her heart and pushing against one of her lungs - soon diagnosed as neuroblastoma, an aggressive form of childhood cancer.
Treatment began immediately and Poppy, who is from Milton Keynes, bravely endured 13 rounds of chemotherapy at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, with side effects including hair and hearing loss, sickness and muscle damage.
But when her body was showing no signs of responding to chemo, her doctors decided to enrol her onto the MiNivAN (corr) clinical trial at University College London Hospital, which saw her receive rounds of a high-dose radiation.
Poppy was injected with 131-I, an iodine-based radioactive drug which targets neuroblastoma cells.
After her first dose in March this year, she spent two weeks in hospital before before being allowed to stay with her grandparents away from her brother.
Following a second dose she was made to stay a further fortnight in hospital before returning to her grandparents.
Parents Claire and Ross Bailey, of Milton Keynes, had to take it in turns to sleep in a room next to Poppy.
Claire said: "It was really hard being away from her like that.
"After the first treatment was allowed to come home for a few days but they measured her levels and she was still radioactive.
"It would have been safe for adults but not Oscar so she had to stay with grandparents."
The little girl from Milton Keynes spent weeks living in an isolated lead-lined room with an airlock style door at a London hospital with only minimal contact allowed with her parents.
Poppy’s mum Claire, 38, had to wear a Geiger counter and avoid coming too close to her daughter.
She said: “The injection only takes 20 minutes and doesn’t hurt but it made Poppy radioactive, which was so hard.
"Normally our bedside routine is lying next to her reading a book until she falls asleep but we couldn't do any of that.
"As a parent you just want to hug them but it’s not allowed.
"The Geiger counter beeps every now and again even when you’re far away, so when I moved closer it started beeping really fast.”
After almost six weeks, Poppy and Oscar were finally reunited outside a hospital in Southampton where she is now undergoing immunotherapy.
The treatment will stimulate her body's immune system to fight cancer ahead of planned surgery to remove the tumour.
Scans taken before the start of the trial showed 33 spots in addition to the tumour, but by early July this had reduced to just nine.
Claire added: “Oscar adores Poppy, he absolutely loves her so he didn’t understand what was going on when she moved out.
"When they saw each other again they just started playing almost as if they had never been apart.
"They did have a little hug and there were tears from me but not from the children.”
Poppy is expected to later undergo further chemotherapy, a stem cell transplant and immunotherapy.
Support care worker Claire and lorry driver Ross have both stopped work so they can look after their daughter around the clock.
Neuroblastoma has a very high recurrence rate and only one in ten children survive a relapse.
The family have taken to fundraising in a bid to raise money for treatments available in New York and Barcelona that could stop the cancer coming back, as they are not available on the NHS yet.
The family have already raised £100,000 towards the £250,000 cost of Poppy undergoing pioneering treatment in America.
Claire said: "When a child has cancer you feel so powerless - you have no control.
"So fundraising is something we can do to give her the best chance of a good future.
"Poppy is amazing and I'm really proud of her.
"When I say you are so brave she says 'what for?' because she doesn't understand how serious it is."
Anyone who would like to help Poppy is encouraged to visit Princess Poppy's Campaign.
