From two years in bed to trekking the Himalayas: Meet the NHS doctor diagnosed with MS 35 years ago who is walking to raise funds after life-enhancing treatment

For two years of her life, Dr Claire Mills was confined to her bed, struggling with debilitating symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis.

Now nearly 60, the Sheffield breast cancer doctor is preparing to walk in the Himalayas in October, a challenge she is grateful she has the opportunity to take on, thanks to life-enhancing treatment.

“By rights, I shouldn’t be doing this challenge,” she says. “I should have poor mobility or be in a wheelchair by now.”

Dr Mills has relapsing remitting Multiple Sclerosis, which was first diagnosed 35 years ago, whilst she was studying medicine at the University of Sheffield.

“It was a bolt out of the blue,” she says. “I was a medical student and I woke up one morning and I couldn’t turn my head without being sick.

“I had vertigo and I was in bed for three or four days.

“Then I started with double vision and one of my eyes wasn’t moving the same as the other one and I felt unsteady. I had a facial palsy too.”

Dr Mills contacted her GP and was admitted to the neurology ward at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital, where she was given steroid treatment.

“I diagnosed myself really. I asked to speak with my neurologist at the time and I said ‘have I got MS?’ and he said ‘yes I think you probably have but we won’t know for a while’.”

Confirmation came a few years later, with another episode whilst Dr Mills was working as a junior doctor.

She’d taken two months off studying after the first bout but had worked hard to catch up with her peers.

This time, she had a demyelinating brain stem encephalitis and spent two years in bed.

“My career was immediately on hold, but there was a possibility it would be over,” she reflects.

“MS made my future very uncertain, and it was a dark period realising I was facing a life of disability and fatigue.”

Dr Mills slowly got back to being able to resume her career, factoring in frequent periods of rest.

But when she returned to work after the birth of her first child, daughter Abigail, she soon realised something had to give.

“I realised very quickly that I couldn’t stay well, look after her and continue working and so the only thing I could really give up in that scenario was my work.”

That she did - and she spent ten years at home with her children (her son Christopher was born four years later), unable to see a way that she could get back to working as a doctor.

Relapses came most years, and though she bounced back, she could never shake the fatigue.

From the year 2000, she was on a disease modifying therapy, which aims to reduce the number and severity of MS relapses.

But in 2005, with the breakdown of her marriage, her health took a turn for the worse.

“I had six relapses in the following year, which reduced my mobility,” Dr Mills recalls.

“At my worst, I couldn’t drive and was walking painfully slowly with two elbow crutches.

“The MS was progressing rapidly, leaving me facing a future of permanent disability.”

Her neurologist - Prof Basil Sharrock- advised a new treatment, a course of chemotherapy to try to stop the decline of her immune system.

“I said fine,” Dr Mills, from the Rivelin Valley, says. “When you’re looking at disability in the face, you’ll try most things really.”

Three years later, Dr Mills returned to work, with a locum position at Sheffield Children’s Hospital.

Sixteen years since that lowest point, she’s has not had another relapse and her health has gone from strength to strength.

Dr Mills now works full time at Sheffield’s Weston Park Hospital and enjoys walking each weekend.

And so when her friend and regular walking companion Sarah Massey, who manages the Children’s Hospital library, suggested they attempt to climb the Himalayas to Annapurna Base Camp, Dr Mills was straight on board.

It was an opportunity for he to tick off one of the remaining few items on her ‘60 things to do before 60’ list - raise money for charity.

Her target is £12,500, a pound for every day since her MS diagnosis.

After funding the travel herself, Dr Mills will be directing the money to two causes - the StarMS stem cell transplant research being led by a team in Sheffield, as well as research trials being funded by the MS Society through the Stop MS appeal.

“My philosophy in life is you can’t always choose what happens to you, but you can choose what you do with it,” Dr Mills says.

“I realised a lot of these years have been given to me because of the treatment.

“I’m happy to be giving something back for what I’ve been given”

The challenge will be an enormous one for Dr Mills, as she confronts altitude and puts her stamina to the test.

She will climb to 4,130 metres and walk for six to ten hours a day, with a total ascent of over 7,000 metres.

Although the distance doesn’t faze her, she has never attempted such a long trek, with walking and climbing day after day.

She says: “The treatment I had here in Sheffield gave me my life back so now I have set myself a huge personal physical challenge before I hit 60 to help other people with MS have the same chance of benefiting too.”

To donate to support Dr Mills’ efforts, visit www.gofundme.com/f/34ust-multiple-sclerosis-research