Why did I have to go abroad to get the best cancer care?
Who would want to wait and watch a prostate cancer tumour grow (Mail) when there’s a painless cure with no permanent side-effects? having been diagnosed with prostate cancer in August 2015, I attended the proton therapy centre in Prague to undergo a course of proton radiation — not the tissue-damaging photon radiation used by the NhS which frequently causes the diabolical and humiliating side-effects mentioned. My treatment lasted for 15 days with me staying in a hotel, walking to and from the Proton Centre, and was complete by September 2015. Each session lasted about ten minutes, during which time I experienced no pain or discomfort. After the treatment was complete, I had some minor side-effects for about four weeks, but nothing debilitating. The day after my return from Prague I was out riding my mountain bike. I went to Prague because proton treatment isn’t available in the UK though several proton centres are being built, some private, some NhS. But the NhS has already decided not to use proton machines to treat prostate cancer. Why is this? The answer is that the number of men with prostate cancer is so great that the NhS machines won’t have the capacity to treat all the patients requiring it. Prostate cancer treatment in Britain is a national disgrace. Pressure needs to be applied to get a decent standard of treatment for the UK’s prostate cancer sufferers. A doctor’s first duty is to his patient — not covering up the inadequacies of the NhS. Proton treatment has been the gold standard for prostate treatment in the U.S. for years, so why not in the UK? The answer is money, because the initial outlay on proton beam equipment is very high. The irony is that ‘sticking plaster’ treatments — like watchful waiting over the years while the cancer grows and maybe spreads — probably ultimately cost the NhS more than proton beam treatment in the early stages of the disease. RICHARD JOSCELYNE,
Leigh-on-Sea, Essex.