A mother-of-four had to go through 18 months of chemotherapy after she was wrongly diagnosed with a rare form of blood cancer.
Janice Johnston was told by doctors at Kent and Canterbury Hospital that she had cancer in April 2017.
But after 18 months of grueling treatment and her condition did not improve, further tests revealed that she actually had no cancer.
The 53-year-old spent almost two years fearing for her life after she was told that she was at high risk of suffering severe health complications.
“The consultant said I was going to be on this chemotherapy for the rest of my life,” Mrs. Johnston shared.
“He said, ‘If you don’t take it, you’re at high risk of having a heart attack, a blood clot anywhere in your body or a stroke’. It was on my mind for 24 hours a day. Those are two years of my life that I’ll never get back.”
Mrs. Johnston was forced to quit her job and the doses of chemotherapy were increased each time she reported that her health hadn’t improved.
“It was horrible telling my children, not knowing if I would be around to see them grow up,” she said.
The mother-of-four also underwent other treatments, including venesection – a procedure that removes blood from the body through a puncture or cut.
“I wasn’t living, I was just existing,” she expressed.
In November 2018, she requested other kinds of treatment as the chemotherapy was not working.
She was then sent to Guy’s Hospital where she was told that she did not have cancer.
“I’ve lost faith in doctors. I just don’t have trust in them. If at the start they gave me a bone marrow biopsy and a scan, then I wouldn’t be sitting here now and I’d still have a job,” she expressed.
Tests revealed that she had a non-cancerous condition which caused her to over-produce red blood cells.
A spokesperson for East Kent Hospital said: “A misdiagnosis of this kind is exceptionally rare and we wholeheartedly apologise to Mrs Johnston for the omission in her care.”
Mrs. Johnston has been given a £76,000 settlement.
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Replaced!