Battle is on to beat rare cancer

A hospital needs £90,000 for research into an incurable cancer. Catherine Scott speaks to one nurse about the horror of myeloma.

A nurse has spoken out for the first time about the pain she sees every day as a result of a devastating form of bone marrow cancer for which there is no cure.

Andrea Foster is backing Sheffield Hospitals Charity’s major new appeal to fund further research into myeloma, which has the potential to eliminate the disease.

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The Clinical Nurse Specialist specialises in myeloma at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital’s Haematology department and is on hand 24/7 to provide education, support and advice for patients suffering what she says is a debilitating disease which also provokes crippling anxiety.

“Myeloma can take a long time to diagnose due to the nature of its symptoms and because it is relatively uncommon. Most people have often never heard of it – they know what cancer is, but not myeloma,” says Andrea. “Myeloma has a massive impact on a patient’s quality of life. The hardest thing to see is the amount of pain they experience. The nature of myeloma means the bone is broken down quicker than it is being repaired. This causes severe back pain, nerve pain and bones that can pathologically fracture and crumble. The treatment for myeloma also has side effects which can cause excruciating nerve damage.

“This type of cancer isn’t curable, but we can still be positive – we can treat it and manage it, initially with medication which is often successful in forcing the cancer into remission.

“But unfortunately it’s a disease of diminishing returns. Remission and treatment gets shorter each time. Some patients can live for many years, but others die within months, often due to an infection as they are immunosuppressed.

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“Those living with myeloma know that it will always be there and will always come back. The second time can often be worse than the first. It’s a cycle of disease and relapse, but there is always hope, until it gets to a point when treatment options have been exhausted.”

Symptoms of myeloma include bone pain, fractures, fatigue, anaemia, kidney damage, infections and hypercalcaemia.

Treatment is aimed at disease control, relieving the complications and symptoms it causes, and extending and improving the quality of patients’ lives.

However, Dr Andrew Chantry, haematology consultant at the Royal Hallamshire Hospital, and his team of researchers have been working on the ‘anti-myeloma virus project’, which has the potential to eliminate myeloma – finally leading to a cure.

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The project has used a genetically engineered virus to target and kill the cancerous myeloma cells without affecting healthy cells. Incredibly, after just two days of being introduced to the virus, myeloma cells were reduced by half and after four days, they had disappeared.

But the team needs £90,000 to continue the research over the next three years, prompting Sheffield Hospitals Charity’s appeal to raise the funds.

“I have seen first-hand the devastating effects this disease has, not only on patients, but their families,” sasy Dr Chantry. “I know every single one of my patients personally and I desperately want to change things for them. I’d like to see every one of them walk out of my ward fit and healthy, without needing to return ever again.

“Thanks to improvements to treatments over the last decade, survival rates are increasing at the fastest rate among all cancer types in the UK. But more research is needed to beat this.

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“My dream is to give myeloma patients hope, hope that one day we will find a cure for this cruel disease. The anti-myeloma virus project, which is being worked on by our team of researchers, has the potential to completely eliminate myeloma – finally leading to a definitive cure.”

And Andrea is urging people to support Dr Chantry’s work and helpt to give her patients a chance.

“I feel terribly sad when patients die. It’s like losing a friend due to the long-term relationship we build together.

“Treatment of myeloma has advanced so much in recent years but further research into the disease and its treatment is so valuable and we have the opportunity to continue this in Sheffield,” she says

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“We know that Dr Chantry’s team are on the verge of a ground-breaking solution, we just need people to dig deep and help us to raise the funds to continue.”

To donate funds for myeloma research, visit www.sheffieldhospitalscharity.org.uk/curemyeloma