15 November 2023 , 11:40
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A man who thought he had a chest infection received a phone call on his birthday with the news that the reality was much worse.
Owen McGrath, 71, decided not to ignore a free NHS lung health check after feeling unwell, going to a mobile unit near his home in Childwall, Liverpool. "I just turned up, they gave me the scan there and then and I went home," he said.
"A couple of weeks later they came back to me to say there was something on the scan that they wanted to investigate further." After treatment at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre and Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital in Broadgreen, he has been given the all-clear. He said: "I'm just so glad I went for the check. I didn't expect it to show anything at all, but I later got a call to say they had found something."
"It was a shock, but it meant I was then given more in-depth scans and tests before they confirmed that it was cancer," he added. "They told me on my birthday but, to be honest, I was just glad they had caught it." Owen is now urging people not to ignore the free check if they are offered one.
The Targeted Lung Health Checks can spot cancer in its earliest stages, often before any symptoms are noticed. But even though Owen's cancer was well developed he had not experienced the usual signs of lung cancer, Liverpool ECHO reports.
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The project, now facilitated by Cheshire and Merseyside Cancer Alliance, has been running in the sub-region since 2019 and the latest figures show that almost 50,000 checks have taken place, with around 35,000 scans carried out and 214 cancers found 85% in the earliest stages when treatment is more successful.
Owen added: "The treatment wasn't too bad in the end. When people think about lung cancer, they think it's a death sentence, especially if the cancer is growing like mine was, but that is just not true. The treatments they have now mean that you have a chance to get through it."
Owen's Oncology Consultant at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, Dr Carles Escriu, emphasised the importance of people attending their lung check appointment if invited because patients are being cured of their disease if it is found early enough.
He said: "Lung cancer is associated with negative stigma and guilt, and there is an inherited fear to cancer therapy that discourages patients from accessing early diagnosis. Most patients that have neoadjuvant chemo-immunotherapy are having excellent responses and cope much better with the treatment than those patients with extensive, incurable disease."
According to the NHS, lung cancer is a common and serious type of cancer. It's diagnosed in over 43,000 people every year in the UK. Early stages often show no signs or symptoms, but as it progresses, symptoms can develop.