A daughter claims GPs used coronavirus to repeatedly stop her mother booking an appointment – only for her cough to turn out to be terminal cancer.
Marina Sendall’s mum Ellie Krzywy has been told she has just six months to live after her chronic cough was eventually diagnosed as lung cancer in August.
However Ms Sendall, 33, claims Gloucester Health Centre in Gloucester, Gloucestershire, ‘didn’t want to see’ patients during the pandemic.
Marina Sendall (left) claims GPs used coronavirus to repeatedly stop her mother Ellie Krzywy (right) booking an appointment – only for her cough to turn out to be terminal cancer
After rejecting Ms Krzywy’s request for a proper appointment, her GP prescribed antibiotics in two separate telephone consultations in June.
They believed the 62-year-old’s symptoms were a sign of a chest infection.
Ms Krzywy was told she has just six months to live after her cough was diagnosed as lung cancer
When she started suffering with severe breathlessness and her lips turned blue, she requested a face-to-face visit.
However the grandmother-of-eight was reportedly told she’d need to take a covid test before a paramedic would see her.
After testing negative for coronavirus, she was quizzed about her symptoms and the practitioner discovered the oxygen levels in her blood had plummeted.
They also discovered her right lung was silent and referred her for an x-ray, which had a fortnight waiting list and an additional seven-day wait for results.
Mum-of-three Ms Sendall, a retail administrator from Gloucester, Gloucestershire, rushed her mother to Gloucester Royal A&E on August 1st.
There, doctors told Ms Krzywy she had small cell lung cancer (SCLC) and had just six months to live.
The mother-of-four says she is ‘very disappointed’ that she was refused a face to face appointment while suffering from cancer.
GPs believed 62-year-old Ms Krzywy’s (pictured) symptoms were a sign of a chest infection and prescribed her antibiotics by telephone consultation
She admits she is still ‘in shock to have so little time left’.
Her daughter claims the doctors who initially refused to see her mother have robbed the family of precious time together by using covid as an ‘excuse’.
Ms Sendall said: ‘I do think Covid was used as an excuse not to see her, it seems that way.
‘Appointments were extremely difficult to get even before lockdown, you were often being dismissed as it is.
‘I don’t know if this [covid] has had a huge impact or whether it’s a ‘get out of jail free’ card [for GPs] thinking ‘now we can blame it on covid’.
She added: ‘If my mum was seen when she first called we probably would have had a different outcome, but at this point it had spread.
‘Maybe she wouldn’t have had a brilliant prognosis but we definitely would have had a lot more time with her.
‘My mum was completely dismissed when she finally got a face-to-face appointment.’
Ms Krzywy’s (left) daughter Ms Sendall (right) claims doctors who initially refused to see her mother have robbed the family of precious time together by using covid as an ‘excuse’
Cleaner Ms Krzywy began chemotherapy that is due to finish at the end of this month following a biopsy and CT scan.
A spokesperson from NHS Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group said: ‘We are very sorry to hear about this patient’s experiences and that the lady concerned and her daughter are unhappy with the service provided.
‘We have been working very closely with our GP surgeries throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to ensure that appropriate arrangements and safeguards are in place to see patients face to face if their medical need requires it.’
Earlier this week, Health Secretary Matt Hancock claimed cancer patients will only be guaranteed treatment if Covid-19 stays ‘under control’.
Mr Hancock claimed that it was ‘critical for everybody to understand the best way to keep cancer services running is to suppress the disease’.
Mother-of-four Ms Krzywy says she is ‘very disappointed’ that she was refused a face to face appointment while suffering from cancer
This is suggesting that hundreds of thousands of patients may face delays to planned surgery and chemotherapy, if the outbreak continues to spiral.
Vital operations were cancelled and patients missed out on potentially life-saving therapy in the spring because tackling Covid-19 became the sole focus of the health service.
Almost 2.5million people missed out on cancer screening, referrals or treatment at the height of lockdown, even though the NHS was never overwhelmed — despite fears it would be crippled by the pandemic.
Experts now fear the number of people dying as a result of delays triggered by the treatment of coronavirus patients could even end up being responsible for as many deaths as the pandemic itself.