I was refused a facial a year after having a mastectomy
A SPA favoured by Meghan Markle and the Beckhams refused to give Nicole Myers a facial – because she had suffered from breast cancer a year before.
The mother of two, 68, told how she had booked in for a treatment following advice from her oncologist but was turned away when she ticked a box stating that she had had cancer.
Instead a therapist offered to sell Mrs Myers, who had a mastectomy and reconstruction in 2016, products to use at home.
She was told by Sarah Chapman spa in West London last November that a client needed to have been cancer-free for five years to be treated.
Mrs Myers said: ‘I had never heard and nobody had ever mentioned to me that there was any problem with having a facial. There’s no link between the breast and the face.’
When she called to book, Mrs Myers, from Chelsea, was not asked about her health. When she arrived she completed a form on her medical history, Mrs Myers said she was ‘ushered into the room and the therapist looked at the form and said to me: “I’m terribly sorry but I can’t give you a treatment”’.
She added: ‘We are quite resilient people. But of course, I probably won’t forget about it. I did get upset but I didn’t show I was upset ... I wouldn’t really want this to happen to anybody else. It was such a shock to me.’
A Sarah Chapman spokesman apologised for ‘any upset’, saying the decision not to treat her was based on patient safety guidelines, adding: ‘The guidelines regarding treatment of cancer patients is a grey area so should there be any element of risk we would always err on the side of caution.’ The clinic said it had treated many cancer patients.