Bianca, who is a patient at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, a specialist cancer centre in Manchester, had the successful operation at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust in summer this year.
Bianca, who lives in Wigan with her dog, a lab called Cubby, was diagnosed with stage four bowel cancer, the most advanced kind, in November 2021. She was just 29 at the time. She had been feeling a bit constipated and bloated, but otherwise had no other symptoms.
She was referred to her local hospital where she had emergency bloods and a stool sample taken. This was followed by a colonoscopy and a biopsy. These investigations revealed that she had bowel cancer which had spread to all eight segments of her liver. According to Cancer Research UK, only one in ten people with advanced bowel cancer will survive for five years or more after diagnosis.
“To be diagnosed with bowel cancer at such a young age was a shock,” Bianca adds. “As it had spread, they told me that they could only offer me palliative chemotherapy. I heard what they said but the prognosis just didn’t seem real, I just couldn’t take it in.
“Even though I didn’t have many symptoms, I had a hunch that something was wrong as I know my body and what’s normal for me. I would encourage anyone who is worried to go and see their GP as soon as possible, as the earlier you are diagnosed, the better.”
Bianca was referred to The Christie’s local treatment centre in Wigan in early December 2021 where she had 37 rounds of a targeted drug called panitumumab and chemotherapy over two and a half years. She had an excellent response to the treatment – it shrunk the tumour – so she then had an operation in May 2023 to remove the part of the bowel where the tumour was.
However, scans showed she still had tumours in her liver, which couldn’t be operated on because of the original spread. She was referred to Leeds, where she was told that she was a good candidate for a transplant because the cancer had spread to her liver only and because, following her operation, she now had no tumours in her bowel.
The team at Leeds is part of a national NHS liver transplant programme for people with non-liver primary cancers and is one of six dedicated centres in the country. Before being able to be added to the list, Bianca had to be doing well on treatment for two years. She hit this milestone in December last year, was added to the list in February 2024, and had her operation in the summer. The surgery was successful, and she is recovering well.
She is now cancer free and her teams at Leeds and The Christie are hopeful that the cancer won’t return.
“Within four weeks of going under the knife, I was able to drive and walk the family dogs, it was really quite incredible,” she says. “To go from being told I’d only have a short time to live to now being cancer free is the greatest gift. I’ve been given a second chance at life and I’m going to grab it with both hands.
“I am so grateful to the family who agreed to donate their loved one’s liver so I could live. Without them making that choice, I wouldn’t be here today.
“I also wouldn’t be here without my incredible teams, both at The Christie and at Leeds. Everything that was happening to me was so scary, but I always felt in incredibly safe hands. I can’t thank them enough for what they’ve done for me,” she continues.
“To see that Bianca has had such a positive outcome is wonderful,” comments Dr. Kalena Marti, Bianca’s oncologist at The Christie. “When we looked at the tumour cells in her liver after it had been removed, they weren’t active. This is excellent news, and we hope that this means that the cancer won’t come back. Advanced bowel cancer is complex and there are lots of different types of the disease, so what works for one person might not work for another. As a result, it’s important that we continue to develop new treatments. Thanks to the generosity of organ donors and their loved ones, we can now access liver transplants for some patients, which is fantastic.”
Dr Ian Rowe, Honorary Consultant Hepatologist at Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “I’m delighted that Bianca has responded so well to the treatment and that she is now cancer free. In Leeds we are the third biggest centre for liver transplantation in the UK, and our specialist team serves a wide population across the North of England. We are, of course, indebted to the family of the organ donor – as is made clear with Bianca’s case, organ donation saves lives. It is important that people register their decision to donate on the NHS Organ Donor Register and make their decision known to their loved ones. Families will always be consulted on any decisions around organ donation.”