Parents of a nine month old girl suffering from a brain tumour, have launched a campaign to secure her the best possible treatment, but are critical of delays in her diagnosis in the Highlands.
They say it was "totally unacceptable" that she spent five days in Raigmore Hospital in Inverness for a series of tests, but no scan was carried out.
Daisy is the youngest daughter of care worker Leah Thomson, 31, and builders' merchant worker Gary Nicol, 31, of Corpach, Fort William. She is the younger sister of their son, Dylan who is three years old.
She was born in June last year, and was diagnosed with an aggressive brain tumour known as ATRT last month
Her parents say that Daisy initially fell ill in January with symptoms of vomiting, falling behind with her physical milestones and increased sleepiness. She then stopped tolerating food and started losing weight. In February she was admitted to Raigmore Hospital in Inverness with dehydration and was allowed home without a diagnosis.
It wasn’t until March 2016 during a second admission to Raigmore Hospital that Daisy received a scan which discovered she had enlarged ventricles. In late March she was taken to the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Glasgow, where an MRI scan found a tumour.
She had surgery to have the tumour removed. This was followed a further operation to have a shunt fitted, a device to relieve pressure from the brain caused by fluid accumulation. She is currently going through a programme of chemotherapy in Glasgow.
Daisy’s mother, Leah Thomson, is now calling on the medical profession to improve the early diagnosis of cancer in children.
“I could not tell you the number of times I spoke to a health visitor or GP about Daisy’s illness. If a parent is coming back repeatedly with a child showing the same unexplained symptoms then it should be investigated. When you look up the type of brain tumour Daisy has (ATRT), then it is shocking that Daisy showed all of the associated symptoms and yet no doctor picked up on this.”
Leah and Gary also feel that the communication between GPs, the out of hours service and other medical professionals needs to be better linked as they feel there were far too many gaps in Daisy's care.
The family have been told that intensive chemotherapy is the only treatment option due to Daisy's age. The family are searching for other treatments should this be unsuccessful. Leah has already been in touch with the Cancer Institute in Boston, USA, who have said they will review her daughter’s case once medical files are released by the NHS.
A campaign has now been set up by members of the Lochaber community to raise funds to help Daisy receive the best treatment and support her family while they are living away from home. The Daisy Fund has already raised over £10,000 through donations and fundraising activities and continues to grow daily.
Leah said she and Gary faced a daunting time ahead. “We need to believe that she will beat this cancer and grow up. To imagine otherwise is unbearable. Although we have been told it’s a small chance of survival, it is still a chance and any chance gives hope."
A spokeswoman for NHS Highland at Raigmore said: "We are sorry the family did not receive the level of care they expected. If there has been a delay we would apologise profusely and would welcome the opportunity to meet with the family to discuss the issue with them and also look at what we can do to prevent a similar situation from happening in the future."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here