‘I’ve accepted my death sentence but I fear for the lives of others’ | UK | News

A seriously ill mother has been “saved” by the kind of service Wes Streeting promised would be available to all cancer patients fearing others would not be so lucky. Louise Beevers was pregnant with her fourth child when she was told she had breast cancer, and a month after her daughter’s birth she was told the disease had spread to her lungs.

The medical team said that they aimed to make his life as comfortable as possible, but that it was not possible for him to recover. The 42-year-old woman, who is struggling to cope with the fact that she may not live to see her children grow up, was very honest in a chat with a healthcare professional during her chemotherapy session.

The mother of four said: “One of the questions in the survey she asked me to fill out was: Have you had thoughts of taking your own life?

“And I had to be honest because the last thing I want is for my cancer to reach my brain, distort my memories, and potentially spend my last days not remembering who my children, my family, or my closest friends are, and that will be their last surviving memory of me.

“And I was very honest and said that if I knew it was going to end up like that, I would remove myself from it. So in essence, I was accepting the fact that I had thoughts of ending my own life, but obviously it wasn’t at the time.”

This led to a referral to the East Midlands Cancer Alliance’s psychosocial health center at the end of 2024. Ms Beevers, from Gainsborough in Lincolnshire, says the reason she is still alive today is because of everything she did with the therapists at the centre.

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He said, “If you imagine a rose and you just peel away the petals and you end up getting to the core where the seeds are, the actual center of the rose and what makes that center the center, then we put all those petals back and then you live your life, you bloom, and that’s what Dr. Adam Hill actually does.

“It has equipped me with the mental stability to be able to say what is important to me, what makes me happy, because ultimately, if I am happy, I can be the best parent I can be for my children.

“But if I’m struggling and feeling so sorry for myself because I’ve been dealt this, how good of a parent will I be to my kids?”

Rumors have been circulating for a year that the service would close, and just days after the Health Secretary announced that all cancer patients in England would receive a personal cancer plan covering their treatment, mental health support and help to return to work, the local NHS in Nottinghamshire has announced a decision about its future.

The Nottingham and Nottinghamshire integrated care board said the service was not closing but would instead be run by another part of the local NHS.

Ms. Beevers, a member of the service’s patient collaboration group, says she is concerned that the treatment patients receive from the new provider will not be up to her standard.

He said: “Anger is an understatement of the first emotion I felt when I discovered they had lost their funding. The second emotion I felt was pure sadness.”

“And unfortunately I have a close friend who was recently diagnosed with cancer, but she will not receive the same mental health support that I do.

“And so I don’t think he’s going to be very successful in this journey that he’s on. He admitted it to me, he did a health survey, he scored incredibly low and he really can’t cope with this diagnosis.”

“Actually, he’s not. He’s definitely the best candidate to get the help I got. If he had gone and gotten help from the EMCA service, his perspective would have been completely different from the one he’s trying to get right now.”

“And I have to say, he’s trying to get through this on his own because he’s not getting any help right now.

“So while we are all reassured that the facilities are still there, the facilities will be diverted to another exit. “To my knowledge, there is no further funding put in place for these designated services.

“These services are not being staffed further. So how long are these waiting lists? And if these waiting lists are stupidly long, how much worse will people like my friends who are already struggling get before help gets to them?”

Asked about changes to the service, a spokesperson for the Integrated Care Board said: “East Midlands Cancer Alliance funding for the service was due to come to an end and so Nottingham and Nottinghamshire ICB collaborated with neighboring ICBs in the East Midlands to ensure the service continued.

“In Nottingham and Nottinghamshire, we have appointed Nottingham University Hospitals Trust to deliver this service and as the trust already provides Level 4 psychosocial services, we offer the benefit of a locally integrated service with more streamlined referral processes.

“There is no pause in referrals. As soon as the previous service stopped receiving new referrals, the new service provider started receiving them immediately.

“As with other services we include, we set the specification of the service and monitor the quality of the service. In this case, the service specification maintains the same access, coverage and quality measures. The new provider is able to accept additional patients due to the relatively small number of patients.”

No matter what you’re going through, you can call the Samaritans free of charge any time on 116 123. Lines are open 24 hours a day. You can also email jo@samaritans.org.