Mrs Smith is 79 and has recently received a negative result from the GALEAS™ Bladder Cancer test. Here she tells us her story.
In 2016, Mrs Smith had an operation on the bottom of her spine to remove an endocrine tumour. Seven years later, during a routine blood test, the clinical team found blood in her urine and sent her for further tests.
After two or three tests, Mrs Smith visited Dr Sachin Agrawal, who performed a cystoscopy to check for bladder cancer and tumours. This procedure involves passing an optic fibre through the urethra and into the bladder, allowing Dr Agrawal to visually inspect her bladder lining and, if necessary, take small tissue samples.
Mrs Smith’s cystoscopy revealed that there was blood around her urethra but was inconclusive regarding the possible presence of bladder cancer. One week after the cystoscopy, Mrs Smith was hospitalised with a bacterial infection, she was severely dehydrated and required medication. Dr Agrawal went to see her in hospital and advised that further investigation was required to rule out bladder cancer but advised against further cystoscopies given the complications.
Instead, Dr Agrawal introduced the GALEAS™ Bladder Cancer service that he was now offering, a urine-based, non-invasive triage test for bladder cancer, which is being adopted by clinicians across the UK.
Mrs Smith said: “I was very pleased that I would not have to undergo another cystoscopy immediately and quickly said yes to the urine test.”
Within three weeks of providing a sample, Dr Agrawal called Mrs Smith into the clinic to discuss the report. He informed her that the results were negative, meaning that there was no detection of the somatic gene variants associated with bladder cancer. This removed the immediate need for a cystoscopy and gave her confidence in GALEAS Bladder testing.
Mrs Smith said: “Dr Agrawal has been fantastic, very caring and finding solutions for me to try and avoid the problems I have had in the past. I am so grateful that there are now non-invasive means to investigate the likelihood of bladder cancer and I’m obviously delighted that the results were negative, which enabled Dr Agrawal to rule out any immediate need for further hospital visits and procedures.
“I have had a lot of medical issues in the past, and it is wonderful that there are now services available that avoid invasive procedures but provide the same quality of results. I am happy to have as many of these tests as I need to, which are simple and pain free!”
