The sister of a recently deceased young mother has heavily criticised doctors for ignoring her sisters plea for help.
On the 7th of December, Katie Delahunty O’Brien passed away as a result of extensive metastatic cancer which was originally in her bowel but had spread to her liver, her lymph nodes, her lungs, her spine and her pelvis.
Sister Fionnuala explains to The Mirror:
“At the beginning of June my sister Katie started to get pains in her abdomen.”
“She had a very upset stomach and she was getting diarrhoea 10 to 12 times a day and was bleeding. She was going in and out of hospital and the doctor’s surgery and was there eight or nine times.”
Katie was diagnoses with irritable bowel syndrome and was given medication.
“On November 16 Katie was having heart palpitations and was going to collapse,” continues Fionnuala.
“She was brought to hospital in an ambulance and they diagnosed her on November 24 with extensive metastatic cancer.”
The 31-year-old mother of two was told it was terminal and that there was no option for treatment.
Her family are heartbroken and are traumatized by the notes left in Katie’s medical files.
“It was devastating to read her medical notes because she was saying to nurses, ‘I know that there is something more serious wrong with me,’” says Fionnuala.
“If there had been a scan, if they had caught it earlier she could have had treatment options.”
Katie was living in London. Her family have made the decision to scatter some of her ashes at the home she shared with her children and some in her native Kerry.
