An intensive care nurse claims her terminal lung tumour went unnoticed because doctors thought she had Long Covid.
Mum-of-one Brogan Williams, who has never contracted the virus, was in remission for breast cancer when she began experiencing back pain and respiratory depression in October 2020.
As the pain was coming from her spine, that's where doctors focused their search, meaning the tumours latched on to her lungs were missed, Birmingham Mail reports.
It wasn't until eight months later after visiting A&E at Wolverhampton's New Cross Hospital, she was told that her cancer was back and worse than before.
Doctors told Brogan that she would need end-of-life care when she was alone without anyone to comfort or support her.
Brogan said: "The last three weeks have been pretty rough.
"I’ve been in remission since October last year but have been going back to GPs and oncologists with pains in my chest, but they told me that I was too young for the cancer to have come back.
"With Covid, you don’t get seen and it’s all telephone consultations.
"I was taken in in February for back pain and had an MRI of my spine, which came back clear.
"But actually, if they’d done a scan of my chest, they would have seen that there was cancer in my lungs at that point.
"Now it’s in both lungs and is very advanced. It’s in my neck and I have two spots on my liver which they can’t rule out as cancer too."
Brogan was diagnosed with breast cancer in January 2019 after husband Gareth, 32, spotted one of her nipples had become inverted.
The couple had been trying for a baby for a year, and thought the inversion could be a sign of pregnancy. She had her period and went to the doctors for a check-up.
Brogan said she didn't "expect" the doctor's diagnosis of stage three breast cancer.
She said: "You don’t expect it. I’d just turned 30 so was planning for the next 30 years.
"I couldn’t get rid of a cold but thought it was something I’d picked up from work.
"Over Christmas 2018 my husband said: 'What’s happened to your nipple?' and I thought I must be pregnant.
"But unfortunately, it wasn’t the case and it was the ‘big C’ instead."
Brogan was in remission when she went to A&E with chest pains on July 18.
Doctors diagnosed her with Covid lung, which is associated with Long Covid - also known as post-Covid-19 fatigue syndrome which manifests as fatigue, persistent high temperatures and breathlessness, among other ailments.
It effects patients who have contracted the virus, which Brogan had no record of having contracted.
Doctors told her to go home and rest, she said, adding that the breathlessness was so severe that she was knocked off her feet while walking up the stairs.
Brogan said: "I was at home with my daughter and could barely walk up the stairs.
"By the next week, I was walking up the stairs and it was like someone had punched me in the back and knocked me off my feet.
"My daughter almost rang 999 because it was only me and her at home.
"I said to myself: ‘Come on Brogan, pull yourself together, it’s just Covid lung'."
The mum-of-one went to her oncologist for a check up regarding her remission, and the doctor found a concerning lump on her neck and sent her for an urgent scan and biopsy.
A CT scan revealed the cancer was back and had spread to her lungs. She said she had to show up at A&E again before she was told about the cancer.
Brogan, who lives in Pendeford, Wolverhampton, said: "I’ve completely been missed at every opportunity.
"There’s a whole persona in the medical community that you’re too young to have secondary cancer.
"Now they’ve left me for as long as they have done, I’ve got the lungs that I have.
"They told me that it was palliative and there was nothing they could do when I was on my own in A&E.
"I’m a bit of a stubborn bugger though so I won’t let them tell me anything.”
Doctors initially blamed Brogan's breast cancer radiotherapy for the pain she was experiencing.
Brogan said: "I felt like they were telling me to stop being silly and to just get on with it.
"They never give you a scan to give you the all-clear because it’s too much radiation so they never actually confirm that you’re cancer-free.
"I’m now waiting for test results to find out exactly what type of cancer it is.
"I’m a ticking time-bomb. They’ve filled the outside of my lungs with talcum powder to try and stop them from filling up.
"The cancer will keep pushing the fluid out and stopping me from breathing until it will eventually completely stop my lungs.
"It’s a case now of waiting to see what I can have a treatment which will be the only chance I’ve got.
"Without treatment, it literally will just kill me."
In the face of severe hardships, and having to battle to get her diagnosis, Brogan said it was her family that kept her going.
Her mum Lorraine, 56, takes care of the young mum most days as husband Gareth works away from home.
Brogan said: "I am so lucky, I feel like I’ve won the lottery with the family I’ve got.
"My daughter is struggling and has been sleeping in the bedroom with us.
"We’re just trying to keep it as normal as possible and trying to divert our mind from what the prognosis is and think of what it could
be.
"When I’m happy, I’m healing because we regenerate good cells so I’m trying not to be in that fight mode.
"I just need to be happy, and if she can see me happy then that’s all that matters.”
The type of cancer Brogan's battling is metastatic breast cancer, which has spread to her lungs.
She has written several letters to five-year-old Freya, for her to read at important moments of her life.
Brogan said: “I’m writing letters for her which people may see as a sign of giving up but it’s me taking control.
"I always want her to know exactly what I’d say to her in certain situations like her first period or the first time she meets a boy and
gets those butterflies.
"It sends your head a bit mental though because you start to accept it."
Friends have set up a GoFundMe page to raise money for the family to go to Disneyland, Florida for a once-in-a-lifetime trip.
Brogan said: “She really is a true princess and I just want her to see the magic.”
In response to Brogan's claims, Gwen Nuttall, chief operating officer at The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust said: “A patient would only be admitted from A&E should there be a clinical reason at that point for them needing to be so. In many cases, further investigations are carried out as an outpatient.
“We are sorry that Brogan feels she didn’t receive the care she would have expected, we would welcome the opportunity to discuss this with her in more detail. Our patient experience team will be making contact with her.”
To donate to the fundraiser, visit: Brogan’s Story.
