Cervical cancer sufferer, 22, left infertile because she was too young for test which could have picked up condition and saved her from a hysterectomy

Cervical cancer sufferer, 22, left infertile because she was too young for test which could have picked up condition and saved her from a hysterectomy

• Natalie Carney diagnosed with cervical cancer over a year after reporting pains to her GP
• She was dismissed as having 'women's troubles' and 'cervical erosion' before cancer was finally spotted
• Natalie believes cancer could have been caught if she had been allowed smear test earlier

By Daily Mail Reporter

PUBLISHED: 07:26 EST, 23 May 2012 | UPDATED: 10:37 EST, 23 May 2012

Ordeal: Natalie Carney believes her cervical cancer could have been caught sooner if she had been allowed a smear test

A cancer sufferer aged just 22 who became one of the youngest women in the country to have a hysterectomy has hit out at the NHS for not giving her a smear test which she believes could have saved her fertility.

Natalie Carney faces an early menopause, chemotherapy and radiotherapy after having her womb removed following the devastating diagnosis earlier this year.

Now Natalie, who became one of Britain's youngest ever hysterectomy patients when she underwent the gruelling in March, believes she would not necessarily have faced infer tility if she had been legally allowed to have a smear test to spot her cervical cancer.

The former air hostess, who is coming to terms with being unable to bear children and going through the menopause before her mother, said if she had been given a smear test at age 20 her cancer could have been treated in its very early stages.

The age at which women in England are offered regular smear tests is 25 even though the rest of the UK offers screening at 20.

The screening age was only increased from 20 to 25 in 2003 as health bosses claimed it did more harm than good in younger women.

Doctors missed several opportunities to diagnose Natalie’s cancer and she was left suffering symptoms for months before the 3.5cm tumour was eventually found.

Despite initially being hopeful the cancer could be removed through fertility-preserving surgery, she was later told she would need a radical hysterectomy, then chemo and radiotherapy.

She now faces a r ace against time to harvest her eggs before she begins treatment in the hope that she and her boyfriend of six months Adam Burton will someday be able to have a child.

Natalie said: 'I shouldn’t be in this position. My cancer had been growing for as long as 18 months before it was discovered. If I had been given a smear test at the age of 20, it would have been pre-cancerous and they would have caught it in time.  

'I feel like my future has been destroyed and I have been forced to rethink everything. Adam and I have only been together for six months and now he may be my only hope to have children.'

Natalie first experienced symptoms in January last year when she started to suffer abdominal pains but it was only when the pain became unbearable in July that she went to Nottingham’s AE department to seek help.

Pretty in pink: Natalie, pictured here on her 18th birthday, had her cervical cancer dismissed as 'women's troubles' and cervical erosion before medics gave her the diagnosis

There she was brushed off and told she was suffering from ‘women’s troubles’.

Natalie was so concerned by the pains she visited her GP a few weeks later and after a brief external examination was told it could be gall bladder infection but was probably nothing to worry about.

Cervical cancer symptoms do not always present all at once so when the pain went away on its own, Natalie decided to take the doctors’ advic e not to worry.

However, in November, she started her relationship with Adam, 23, and experienced more pain when their relationship became physical.

But when she returned to her GP after suffering bleeding, there was still no mention of a smear test - with doctors instead recommending she be tested for sexually transmitted infections.

Natalie said: 'I wasn’t very happy about that, I felt like she was assuming I had been sleeping around even though before I got together with Adam I hadn’t been in a relationship with anyone for over a year.

'Like a lot of girls, I had lost my virginity at 16 but I was responsible and I had been suffering from stomach cramps for the last year. I knew it couldn’t be that but I agreed to the tests anyway.

'The nurse explained to me that it would be just like a smear test but I had to say to her that I had never had one because I was only 20 so I wasn’t allowed one.

'At no point did it occur to anyone to offer me a smear test.'

Natalie began bleeding while the swabs were being taken and from the look on the nurse’s face, she says, she knew there was something wrong.

Natalie, pictured at a charity prom earlier this year with boyfriend Adam, 23, has had to come to terms with not being able to bear children

The doctor was called in and it was agreed that Natalie would be referred to a gynaecologist. But, she says, she was assured it was unlikely there was anything wrong because of her young age.

The doctor and gynaecologist were convinced Natalie was likely to be suffering from a condition called cervical erosion which can cause bleeding in between periods.

However a colposcopy and biopsy revealed the worst possible truth. Natalie’s test results came back as positive for cancer.

She said: 'Once someone tells you that you have cancer your whole world stops right there.

'I couldn’t take in anything else the doctor said after that. I felt dizzy and sick for the rest of the day, it just wouldn’t sink in.'

Following an MRI scan Natalie was told that she may be able to have a trachelectomy, an operation that would remove the affected part of her cervix and then repair it to give her a good chance of being able to have children in future.

But on closer inspection of the scan results it was decided the tumour was too large to treat in this way and a radical hysterectomy would be necessary.

Her tumour had been graded IB-I meaning it was less than 4cm in size and at stage one.

She added: 'My womb would be removed so I would never be able to carry children of my own but it would mean I would still have my ovaries so I wouldn’t go through the menopause and I might someday be able to use my eggs in IVF and have children throug h a surrogate.

'Until then I had never really given my fertility much thought. I was studying at night to become a nurse and I was concentrating on my career but I had always imagined that I would have a family someday.

'Now I was being forced to think about the future and how it wasn’t going to pan out the way I imagined.'

Natalie underwent the four-and-a-half hour operation in March at Nottingham City Hospital during which her lymph nodes were removed to be tested to see if the cancer had spread.

Constant reminder: Natalie shows the scar running up her naval on the day she underwent the hysterectomy operation in March this year

But two weeks later she received the news she had been dreading - that the cancer had advanced to her lymph nodes and blood vessels, meaning five weeks of chemotherapy and radiotherapy which would rob her of her fertility.

Natalie said: 'I was devastated. I was going to have to watch all my friends have children and my sister who already has a child bringing their families into the world and I would never be able to do the same.

'The treatment was supposed to start in three weeks and it would ta ke at least four to harvest my eggs. The cancer specialist told me not to hold my breath if I wanted to get funding but that they would delay the treatment for an extra week.'

Now Natalie is in a race against time to harvest enough eggs to create a few embryos with her partner Adam that will be frozen for the future.

Family fear: Natalie, pictured right with her mother Melanie and half-sister Danielle, 20, has battled through the procedure with family support

Even though the young couple have not been together long, Adam agreed to the procedure which would give Natalie’s eggs a greater chance of survival. Even if the IVF is successful, there is only a 32 per cent chance the embryos will take once they are reimplanted.

Natalie’s half sister Leigh-ann Cooke, 30, is at high risk for cervical cancer and receives a smear test every six months.

But despite the family history, Natalie’s other sister Danielle, 20, was told she was not eligible to have a test when she visited the doctor to ask for one. As a young mum, Danielle is at higher risk of cervical cancer too.

Happier times: Pictured in July last year before a holiday with four friends, Natalie had no idea what heartbreak lay ahead of her

Natalie said: 'I’m dreading the chemo and I’m trying not to think about how much it will make me sick. Mostly I am terrified of lymphoedema which is one of the common side effects of the drugs they use.

'I’m also scared of going through the menopause as even my mum hasn’t gone through it yet and I don’t know what to expect.

Natalie is part of a campaign to have the age limit lowered and says she is proof that women are being overlooked by the law.

The Mercedes Curnow Foundation, set up in me mory of the woman by the same name who died of cervical cancer aged 23, recently presented a 122,600-signature petition to Downing Street asking to have the age limit for smear tests lowered.

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