Paralympian: All-clear scan for tumour is better than winning gold
A SCOTS Paralympian has said an MRI scan showing no sign of a tumour that had threatened to crush his spinal cord was better than winning a gold medal.
David Smith, 37, of Aviemore, had surgery to remove the tumour close to his spine last year.
He said the MRI scan he was shown earlier this week was the first scan since 2013 not to show a tumour.
Smith said it was better than winning gold at the London Paralympics in 2012. The athlete won the medal in rowing. Following that success he has been training to compete in cycling.
However, the tumour had affected that pursuit and even risked crushing his spine and stopping him from breathing.
Smith said he had been dreading the results of his latest MRI scan, fearing it would still show the tumour.
He said: “I almost passed out. I thought I was going to be sick and I didn’t even want to look at the scan.”
After being shown the scan the athlete said he went through a “rollercoaster of emotions”.
He said: “It took two or three hours for it to sink in. When it did sink in I was on the train home and I just started crying.”
Friends and supporters last year raised around £15,000 to pay for his medical treatment.
Mr Smith had planned to switch to cycling to compete in the Rio 2016 Paralympics, but in January last year he learned his tumour had grown back and risked cutting off his ability to breathe.
Surgeons removed the tumour for the third time in March, but the nine-hour operation left Mr Smith struggling to move the left side of his body, ending his plans to compete in Brazil.
Also last Mr Smith year checked himself out of a world-famous NHS hospital and was paying £2,000-a-week out of his life-savings for treatment “better suited” to him representing Great Britain again.
He was born with a club foot, but represented Great Britain in able-bodied karate between 1993 to 1999 and bobsleigh from 2002 to 2008 before turning to paralympic events.
Mr Smith was awarded an MBE in the New Year’s Honours list for 2012. In June 2015, seven months after his previous surgery, he cycled up Mont Ventoux in France.