Woman given five years to live is in remission for the first time in two decades

GRAN HAD COUNTLESS TREATMENTS FOR INCURABLE CANCER BEFORE FINALLY RECEIVING 'MIRACLE DRUG'

- By ELEANOR FLEMING, PA

A GRANDMOTHER given five years to live after a sudden nosebleed prompted an incurable cancer diagnosis is now in remission for the first time in more than two decades.

Kathryn Oddie, 63, a retired practice nurse from Mansfield, was diagnosed with the incurable blood cancer myeloma in 2000 and initially given up to five years to live.

Over the following two decades, Kathryn had countless forms of therapy, most of which were trials, and suffered infections which left her in hospital “every week or every other week”.

She missed many milestones, such as her daughter Gemma’s first baby shower, and in 2020 she was told she had exhausted all treatment options - until a “miracle drug” became available in 2021.

Within around six months of taking “life-changing” treatment teclistamab, Kathryn finally received the news she had reached remission for the first time in 21 years.

While the cancer and intensive treatments were “gruelling, and there is a possibility the disease could return, Kathryn now wants to focus on the memories she is yet to make with grandchildren George, seven, and Hattie, four.

“I remember a consultant once told me, ‘My main goal is to get you to 40,” Kathryn said. “Never in a million years did I think I would be standing at the school gate taking my grandchildren to school. We have them with us two days a week and when they see us, they run to us. Everything stops for the grandchildren.”