A York family of a young woman who has died of cancer at 19 is demanding answers after saying she waited more than a year to see a GP.
Amelia Ellerby first found a small lump on her back in February last year. She filled in an online form to contact her doctors’ surgery, the Priory Medical Centre on Cornlands Road, Acomb.
A doctor rang and asked her a few questions, and said she’d be referred for a scan but there was a six month waiting list, her aunt Claire Hanshaw told YorkMix.
She still had the lump six weeks later and got back in touch and was prescribed antibiotics after another GP phone consultation.
Amelia lived with Claire who said they were still relaxed about it at this stage. “With the doctors just prescribing antibiotics and not seeing her, we did kind of think, well there’s probably not much to worry about.”
As the lump persisted she repeatedly contacted her GP surgery but was told to wait for the scan. Until March this year, when a doctor said he would see her in person for the first time – over a year after she first raised her concerns.
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The doctor said the lump by now was 10cm x 3cm, and quite hard to the touch. “And he seemed to be concerned because of how hard it was,” Claire said.
He immediately referred her to York Hospital and she got an appointment two days later. She got an MRI scan, and the results were sent to Leeds for analysis. By this time Amelia was regularly complaining of back ache.
The pain became so bad she went to A&E in April. A CT scan followed which showed masses on her lungs. It wasn’t until May that they had the full diagnosis – she was suffering from stage 4 cancer, which had spread to her stomach, liver and lymph nodes.
“That’s when they ended up diagnosing her and telling us that she only had a few months,” Claire said. “Even then they still didn’t have any biopsy results. So it was just from the scans that they had to tell us.”
She said it was a great shock. “We prepared ourselves for the news to be bad, but we still weren’t expecting it to be that.”
Amelia died on 12 June, aged just 19.
Should have seen her earlier
Claire said if doctors had seen her when she first reported the lump “they’d have probably been able to treat it.
“If they had seen her when it was as small as it was, it might have just been a matter of giving some treatment and removing it.
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“If it had already spread at that point, then it would have been a bit different. But I still think it would have been able to be treated, and gave her longer even if it wasn’t curable.
“When she first got in touch with doctors we were in lockdown – but obviously we came out of lockdown. I still think she could have been seen a lot sooner than she was.
“And they need to take people more seriously when they are ringing up because of lumps. I think that they don’t bother as much when they’re young.”
Amelia, a former pupil at Huntington School who worked at Askham Bryan College then at Morrisons, “was very lively and energetic,” said Claire. “You could hear her before you saw her.
“She was always having friends around. And she loved animals.”
Amelia’s funeral, with a superhero theme, was yesterday (Thursday) at York Crematorium.
Claire says she has been through a huge amount of emotions. “I feel angry. I feel sad.
“I just hope it helps other people. I hope it encourages people, if they do find a lump, to be more on at the doctors to get seen quicker.”
She added: “To lose your life at 19, it’s no age – you haven’t lived a life, have you?”
The health service response
The Priory Medical Group said they could not comment on individual cases.
A spokesperson for York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said: “Our sympathies are with Amelia’s family at this terribly sad time.
“The way appointments are allocated and prioritised for diagnostic procedures such as scans is dependent on the nature of the referral that we receive, either from a GP or a clinician within the hospital.
“If a referral is made to investigate a potential cancer, then this is fast-tracked and would be done quickly, usually within two weeks. We continued to receive fast-track referrals and maintain this service throughout the pandemic.
“Early detection and diagnosis of cancer is incredibly important and we would encourage anyone who has any concerns to contact their GP as soon as possible.
“We would also encourage Amelia’s family to contact us if they have any questions about the care she received.”