'Allergy rash' was sign of something far more serious

WHAT Sue Torkington thought was a harmless reaction to some food at first turned out to be the first sign of a life-changing diagnosis.

- HOLLY MORGAN Reporter holly.morgan@reachplc

As a nurse, Sue, from Monmouthshire, thought she would know if something was wrong - but she didn’t.

Unbeknownst to the 79-year-old when she noticed a rash on her hand while out on her Bristol shopping trip, it was the first indicator she had stage four cancer.

Sue said: “We had just had lunch out and I thought perhaps the rash was because of something I had eaten - you know, perhaps a mild reaction to an ingredient had caused it. I didn’t really think anything of it.

“Then I noticed it was coming and going and appearing in different places but I still couldn’t make any connection that anything could be that wrong other than I had a bit of a cold too.

“I started to question things more after I had a blood test and it showed I was slightly anaemic.

“Being a nurse I was a bit concerned because I knew there was no reason for me to be anaemic.”

Sue's career in nursing has spanned decades and continents, from her early days at Southmead Hospital in Bristol to leading a European nursing programme in the Netherlands and Spain.