My cancer diary: ‘That was a hell of a wake – I hope I’ll remember it for years’

Tuesday 15 November

After four days of in-patient treatment – intensive rehydration, intravenous antibiotics and two units of blood, not to mention so many blood tests that “find the vein” became an almost full-time staff pastime – I’m feeling much better. So now back at the Royal Marsden [specialist cancer treatment hospital] for blood tests ahead of what I hope will be more chemotherapy treatment on Thursday.

And good news! Blood pressure’s up and stable; platelets and white blood cells all well within safe range – so all clear for treatment. This is quite a relief, and I’m sure I’m not the only cancer patient – or physician, for that matter – who feels this, but having to miss treatments is frustrating and a bit of a worry. The fear being that as treatments are skipped, the cancer and its offshoots will regain ground, thus making them harder to treat further down the line. Anyhow, none of that this week!

Thursday 17 November

Having missed a week of treatment, whereas this should’ve been a double drug week – paclitaxel on the NHS, and ramucirumab up in the private patients’ “suite” – in fact, as we’re in what is in effect now week two in the cycle, it’s NHS paclitaxel only.

Infusion goes well – once they’d found a vein for the cannula (the rather clever device through which infusions are delivered into veins). With the cold cap applied I still live in hope that I won’t lose my hair. And what a relief to have actually got another round of treatment!

Friday 18 November

In Manchester today for an appearance on BBC Breakfast’s sofa at an outside broadcast they’re doing to mark the end of a series of reports on cancer – one of which, as I think I mentioned before, featured me and a conversation with my old friend Nick Robinson about how to discuss cancer with family, friends and the world beyond. The programme came from the Maggie’s centre at the Christie hospital. Maggie’s centres are there for people with cancer – and others affected by it: carers, family, friends etc – to drop in for help, advice or just a chat.

It was heartening to meet other people living with cancer – and a great coming-together moment when the presenter tried to tell three of us we had “terminal” cancer, which was met with a good humoured but unanimous raspberry. The only certainties in life are, as they say, death and taxes, and so it is when you’ve got cancer. I might have weeks, months, years or even a full lifespan ahead of me. I know I’ve got advanced cancer and well recognise that changes the odds considerably – but I’m not out yet and neither were any of my fellow contributors.

I was asked one question, though, which really made me think. Why had I decided to be so public about my cancer? Which as I sat in the Maggie’s centre did make me think about how privileged my position is compared with so many others with cancer diagnoses.

First, I’m a journalist and so have a way of approaching my own disease which interests and engages me as a story in its own right and – as any journalist will attest – once you’ve got a story, the urge to tell it is almost irresistible. Second, I have access to ways of telling it both on the radio and in print. And third, I’m not 35 and still building a career or in the dating game or running my own business where I’m the key business winner. Who would want to tell a prospective boss or date or client about a diagnosis like mine? Nor am I facing a relationship breakdown by revealing all – you don’t exactly make yourself an investment by telling people you’ve got cancer.

For me, by contrast, there is virtually no downside. I suppose what I’ve realised is that for many people, that’s just not the case. So there is a long way to go in terms of society in general coming to terms with the realities of cancer – after all, Cancer Research statistics suggest that one in two of us will get it at some point in our lives.

Tuesday 22 November

Back to the Marsden today for blood tests ahead of treatment on Thursday – I hope! I’ve been feeling generally OK, although pesky kidney stones have been back. Unfortunately, the tests show that my platelet count has dropped again and so has the level of the white blood cells – critically important to fighting infections.

My consultant, Dr Starling, appears even more fed up and disappointed than me, especially because there are some very early signs – no symptoms from the main tumour at all, improved liver function and other markers showing positive – that might suggest the new regime is working on the cancer. Trouble is, it might also be rendering me unable to safely receive it. Consultant wondering – but really hoping not – whether I might be in the 2% of people (yes, 2%) to whom the drug paclitaxel appears to do this. Naturally I am with her on this!

So treatment on Thursday now looking unlikely. More self-injections to promote white blood cell production prescribed, and more blood tests (we really are running out of veins) booked for early Thursday morning …

Wednesday 23 November

Up at 6.15 to prepare for The Media Show. But, to be honest, the kidney stones are killing me, the medication can make one a bit dopey, and I’m feeling pretty fatigued. So 7am speak to producer, who takes the news brilliantly well and sets out to find a stand-in presenter. I always feel bad doing this but BBC Radio has been really brilliant about it, and I guess if I did present a programme and made a hash of it I’d feel quite a lot worse.

Thursday 24 November

Back at the Marsden. Blood results not great so definitely no treatment today. Another date missed and more of the frustration and underlying issues to worry about. But a platelet infusion later and it’s onwards and upwards!

Friday 25 November

Months ago I agreed to a request from the Media Society – and the London Press Club and the Royal Television Society – to consider participating in an evening looking at my career. Flattering and hard to turn down in many ways but weirdly like an invitation to my own wake. With the help of BBC Radio they managed to get the historic Radio Theatre at Broadcasting House, home to so many BBC comedies and performances. And the event is tonight!

It is framed as an interview between me and Roger Bolton, presenter of Radio 4’s Feedback but a TV executive of many, many years’ experience who once upon a time as editor of Nationwide gave me my first proper job in telly. Well, 300 guests and a packed Radio Theatre beckoned – and, I should say, with every likelihood of a £2,000-plus donation to the Marsden charity. But what had I let myself in for?

Back at the Marsden again, the platelet count had improved but there was no significant movement on the white blood cells and the amazing Dr Starling was actively worrying about whether I should even do the Radio Theatre event. Ultimately she relents, and with a very strict set of instructions – get a cab there and back, stay away from anybody with a cough or cold, and if you get a temperature or even feel just really off, call the emergency helpline immediately – gives me her blessing.

Audience reaction was truly amazing and utterly humbling. As wakes go, it’ll be one to remember – which I trust I will for many years to come!

To donate to Maggie’s centres, visit maggiescentres.org

My cancer diary: ‘That was a hell of a wake – I hope I’ll remember it for years’

Doc Martin? Being a GP ‘is much more fun than that’

Family doctors are launching a campaign to explode the “myth” that hospital teams in television dramas such as Casualty and Holby City are the only medics with exciting and important jobs.

GP leaders hope the initiative will dispel the idea that their members do mundane jobs that involve treating nothing more serious than colds and coughs.

The Royal College of General Practitioners wants to persuade young doctors, and even teenagers gearing up for GCSEs, that family doctors are a linchpin in the community and help patients with a range of medical problems.

The initiative comes as new royal college research shows that the UK is facing the potential closure of 594 practices by 2020 because of early retirement and recruitment difficulties. On current trends, by 2020 Britain will be 9,940 GPs short of the number needed to cope with an ageing and growing population, it believes. The campaign, Think GP, seeks to tackle the negative portrayals of GPs on screen and show hospital doctors are not the only ones with challenging roles that affect people’s lives. It wants to banish “the falsehood that circulates in certain parts of the medical world that the role of a GP is somehow run-of-the-mill”.

The college says hospital dramas such as Casualty are “adrenaline-fuelled, with highly skilled medical professionals carrying out exciting procedures and saving lives”. However, Professor Maureen Baker, the royal college chairwoman, said: “When GPs are portrayed on TV, they are unhinged, such as [in] Doctor Foster, grumpy failures like Doc Martin, or inept, as we often see in Doctors.”

The best-known GP in British popular culture is still Dr Finlay, but that drama was 50 years ago

Prof Maureen Baker, RCGP chair

Baker said the best-known GP in British popular culture is still Dr Finlay – the homely GP in the fictional Scottish town of Tannochbrae featured in Dr Finlay’s Casebook – “yet the programme is more than 50 years old”.

She added: “We’re grateful to our colleagues who take part in programmes such as GPs Behind Closed Doors that attempt to showcase the diversity of our profession, but with the scale of the challenge ahead, more needs to be done.”

Starting this week, Think GP is to use videos and social media to promote what the college extols as the “varied and fulfilling” life of a family doctor.

“Our new Think GP campaign explodes the myth that general practice is the poor relation of hospital specialities. In general practice no two days are the same.

“Every day in our surgeries, we manage the care of patients with multiple and complex conditions that even a decade ago would have been automatically referred to hospital,” Baker said.

It aims to persuade freshly qualified young doctors, medical students and even A-level and GCSE pupils to see general practice as a serious career option.

The college warns that early retirement in the face of increasing workloads has contributed to understaffing while some parts of Britain, such as the north-east and east Midlands, face real problems in recruiting young GPs.

The boss of the NHS in England is backing the college’s campaign. NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens recently pledged to increase spending on general practice from £9.6bn to £12bn a year by 2020-21, and to cut the red tape that GPs face and reduce the work that hospitals pass on to them.

Casualty actor Rosie Marcel as Jac Naylor … just your average consultant cardio-thoracic surgeon. Photograph: Alistair Heap/BBC/Alistair Heap

“There’s arguably no more important job in modern Britain than that of family doctor,” he said. “There’s not a family in the country that won’t at some point rely on the skill, care and dedication of their GP, and there’s no other branch of medicine that offers greater variety, stimulation and opportunity.”

A brochure to be distributed by the college as part of the campaign describes a GP as “an expert medical generalist – someone able to understand the multiple conditions patients have, as well as their wider health and wellbeing”.

The college says that big changes in how NHS care is delivered in future will mean that “a career as a GP will become more and more intellectually and medically challenging, diverse and fulfilling. GPs will have portfolio careers heading multidisciplinary teams, leading work in areas from geriatrics to neurology, running ‘in-reach’ to hospitals and ‘outreach’ to patients’ homes.”

The campaign is to highlight five GPs who do much more than simply hold surgeries in order to show the variety and responsibility the job involves. One of them, Dr David Hogg, whose practice is on the Scottish island of Arran, also works in the local hospital and is part of the mountain rescue team. Another, Dr Louise Rusk, successfully juggles a career as a GP with working for a hospital-based headache clinic in Northern Ireland and raising two daughters.

NHS England called the Think GP initiative “an important step” towards strengthening the GP workforce in the face of rising patient demand.

A spokeswoman added: “Anyone choosing to become a GP can look forward to a varied and hugely rewarding career, looking after patients and their families, rather than being consulted on particular diseases.”

Doc Martin? Being a GP ‘is much more fun than that’