'My cancer misdiagnosis means I can no longer walk'

Karen Davey says her hot flushes and fatigue were dismissed as menopause until she was eventually admitted to hospital

- REBECCA THOMAS

A woman has been left unable to walk after her spinal cancer symptoms were mistaken for signs of the menopause and a gardening injury. Karen Davey, 54, from Cornwall, began experiencing hot flushes, fatigue, and loss of appetite in early 2024, but she assumed these were menopause symptoms.

But by March 2024, she developed pain in her kidneys and went to visit her GP. However, she was told the back pain was due to gardening, despite having only done 20 minutes of this.

Over the next two months, her symptoms worsened and she stopped eating properly, lost weight, and developed a temperature, later losing all sensation in her legs, as well as bladder and bowel function. After being taken to the hospital and admitted for two weeks, she was given the devastating news that she had stage 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma in her kidneys, and a tumour wrapped around her spinal cord.