When doctors told me I had diabetes I didn’t realise they’d missed the sinister true cause of my symptoms. Many people only live for four months after they find out the truth – here’s what you MUST know to look for

Ali Stunt, 40, was the picture of health; slim, active and busy raising two young children. He exercised regularly, ate well, and had no family history of serious illness. So when a routine blood test showed he had high blood sugar (a condition in which type 2 diabetes is often linked to excess weight), it didn’t make much sense.

But he dismissed it as ‘just one of those things’ and moved on.

Ali, now 60 and a charity CEO from West Sussex, says: ‘I didn’t think anything of it at first; It was just annoying. ‘There was no talk of it being linked to anything more serious.’

He was not initially prescribed medication and instead was advised to maintain a healthy diet and increase the exercise habits he was already following.

However, there was no improvement in blood sugar levels in the following months. Then new symptoms began to appear.

‘I started feeling a strange pain in my back, like a tennis ball pressing against the band of my bra,’ she says. ‘I had a gnawing pain that radiated forward and left me bent over when I ate.’

Ali repeatedly went to the GP seven or eight times over several months but was told he had muscle tension, indigestion or possibly irritable bowel syndrome. He was advised to take over-the-counter medications such as Gaviscon, but nothing helped.

The pain worsened and she began experiencing diarrhea and unexplained weight loss. ‘One day my husband saw me bent over and took me to A&E,’ she says. ‘But they gave me tramadol and sent me home without any explanation.’

Doctors eventually recommended Ali have an ultrasound, and he decided to have it done privately after being told a waiting period of four to six weeks.

Professor Hemant Kocher, from Queen Mary University of London, says the link between new-onset diabetes and pancreatic cancer is increasingly recognized but not fully understood.

Later, a doctor working after hours claimed that he had pancreatitis; A dangerous inflammation of the pancreas, a gland in the abdominal area that produces insulin, the hormone that regulates blood sugar.

He gave her morphine and advised her to see a GP the next day.

When Ali was told he would have to wait four to six weeks for his NHS ultrasound, he decided to seek help privately.

‘When the counselor saw me in the waiting room later, he said he knew immediately that he would accept me,’ he says. ‘I was very, very sick.’

An ultrasound and CT scan revealed a 5.5 cm tumor in his pancreas.

I was diagnosed with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma, the most common type of pancreatic cancer.

Hearing the diagnosis was devastating, but telling his children, who were 10 and 14 at the time, was even harder. ‘They were old enough to Google it,’ he says. ‘One closed and the other screamed that it wasn’t fair. ‘This was the worst thing I’ve ever had to do.’

Within weeks, Ali had major surgery to remove 80 percent of his pancreas and spleen, followed by chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

What is striking in hindsight is that the earliest warning sign (sudden onset of diabetes) was not recognized.

However, doctors later realized that he had never had type 2 diabetes. Instead, the reason his blood sugar rose was because the tumor was damaging his pancreas, affecting its ability to produce insulin and digestive enzymes.

This condition is known as type 3c diabetes or pancreatogenic diabetes, which occurs when the pancreas is damaged, sometimes due to conditions such as pancreatitis or, more rarely, cancer.

Experts say his story highlights a growing area of ​​concern.

Professor Hemant Kocher, from the Barts Cancer Institute at Queen Mary University of London, says the link between new-onset diabetes and pancreatic cancer is increasingly recognized but not fully understood.

One challenge is that type 3c diabetes is often misdiagnosed as type 2.

Prof Kocher says: ‘There is no simple blood or urine test to distinguish between the two. ‘They can look very similar at the point of diagnosis.’

Some researchers believe that some people diagnosed with type 2 diabetes may actually have type 3c; especially if these people are healthy and the condition occurs suddenly.

When she raised the possibility of type 3c diabetes with her GP, she was told there was no such diagnosis. Formal confirmation of type 3c only occurred after a referral to an endocrinologist.

Pancreatic cancer remains one of the deadliest cancers because it is very difficult to detect early. It has the lowest survival rate of all common cancers in the UK; About a quarter of patients survive one year, and only 7 to 8 percent live five years.

For most people, the diagnosis is made too late. Average life expectancy is only four to six months.

Next year, Ali will mark 20 years since his diagnosis, a milestone only a minority of pancreatic cancer patients reach. Ali, the founder of the charity Pancreatic Cancer Action, helped persuade health watchdog NICE to include new-onset type 2 diabetes in its pancreatic cancer referral guidelines when combined with other symptoms; This is an important step towards early diagnosis.

Above all, she wants others to be aware of warning signs and to press for answers if something doesn’t feel right.

‘You are a statistic,’ he says. ‘This is your disease, your treatment, your outcome; and the sooner it is found, the better your chances of survival.’