I’m suing NHS for saying I was dying of cancer

THEY told Phil Collins he had cancer and only six months to live. So he quit his job, cashed in his pension and spent £18,000 in what he thought were the last months of his life.

But they were wrong. And now Phil, 61, is suing the NHS after his tumour turned out to be a harmless abscess.

He left work and spent the payout after doctors said he had inoperable gallbladder and liver cancer. After being told he was dying, he also arranged his own funeral, bought his wife Isabel a car and made financial plans for her after his death.

But when he went back to hospital further checks showed that the growth on his liver was in effect harmless. The former lorry driver, from Yetminster, Dorset, said yesterday that the cancer drugs that he was given had ruined his health.

"I was a fit man and I was a keen motorcyclist," he said. "I still had a lot of working life left in me. Now I cannot do anything. I am an absolute wreck. I feel I am just generally shutting down, I am blown up like a balloon, I cannot eat, I cannot keep anything down."

He first went to see doctors at Dorset County Hospital in April 2007 suffering weight loss, anaemia and a loss of appetite. A scan showed an abnormal gallbladder which was diagnosed as advanced cancer. Phil was advised to quit his job and Isabel, 62, also stopped working as a part-time cleaner to care for her ­husband.

Source: Daily Express