Pancreatic cancer survival rate: Survivor reveals five symptoms as he battles disease for second time

A pancreatic most cancers survivor battling the illness for a second time has shared the early indicators individuals of all ages ought to know.

Charles Czajkowski, 63, a enterprise improvement supervisor for a geotechnical firm from Surbiton, Kingston, has “declared conflict on pancreatic most cancers” after a five-year ordeal with two rounds of the illness – which additionally precipitated the loss of life of his mom Romaulda, aged 78, in 1999.

Mr Czajkowski, who’s hoping remedy he obtained by means of his spouse’s personal healthcare package deal will save his life, is ready to talk to MPs on within the Commons on Wednesday to induce the federal government to supply larger funding for the situation.

He’ll communicate alongside 20 others who both have the illness or who’ve misplaced somebody to it as a part of Pancreatic Most cancers Consciousness Month.

After his well being started to say no in 2017, Charles confronted a collection of delays to his prognosis and remedy by means of the NHS till he accessed Bupa healthcare by means of the office of his spouse of 16 years, Jackie Czajkowski.

After preliminary remedy success, in Might 2022 Charles’ most cancers returned and personal oncologists are actually making an attempt to make use of a collection of medicine, a few of that are unavailable on the NHS, to avoid wasting his life.

Now working to combat the sickness and assist sufferers to identify it early, Charles is a pancreatic affected person consultant and on the scientific advisory board for Pancreatic Most cancers UK.

He’s additionally a pancreatic affected person consultant for NHS Most cancers UK, as a part of the federal government’s 10-year plan to assist optimise the early diagnostics and early remedy plan for anyone with pancreatic most cancers, liver most cancers or biliary most cancers.

“It’s given me management,” Charles mentioned.

“Pancreatic most cancers has declared conflict on me… so to get again at it, I’ve declared conflict on pancreatic most cancers by with the ability to assist educate and save different individuals’s lives.

“It’s an consciousness battle as a result of pancreatic most cancers UK hasn’t had a lot air time and hasn’t had the funding.”

Charles’s ordeal as a most cancers affected person started in 2017 when he was identified with kind two diabetes.

Midway by means of that 12 months, he had a pancreatic assault – also called acute pancreatitis – which, in keeping with the NHS, is a extreme ache which begins instantly within the centre of a affected person’s stomach and can be accompanied by vomiting and a excessive temperature.

For the remainder of the 12 months, Charles was underneath remark amid repeated pancreatic assaults and he was quickly dropping pounds, dropping from 85kg to round 75kg at 6ft tall.

“One other signal that issues weren’t going proper was that my pancreas wasn’t producing the enzymes and so I began getting what they name pancreatic diarrhea, which is a real signal in case your meals’s not being digested correctly,” Charles added.

In consequence, his GP prescribed Charles Pancreatic Enzyme Alternative Remedy (Pert) which made Charles’ weight secure as he was now in a position to take in vitamins.

From there, Charles was despatched to a collection of various hospitals for scans and assessments.

Finally, at the start of March 2019, additional exams revealed a 10-millimetre tumour on the top of Charles’ pancreas.

On March 25 2019, Charles met with the top of the surgical group at Hammersmith Hospital alongside his spouse and a Macmillan nurse.

“He mentioned to me, Charles, you don’t have continual pancreatitis, you could have pancreatic most cancers,” Charles mentioned.

“They’d a Macmillan nurse there as a result of clearly individuals usually go into shock.

“However I instantly simply mentioned, ‘Okay, so what are we going to do about this Professor?’”

The NHS physician defined to Charles {that a} whipple process to take away the top of the pancreas, the primary a part of the small gut, the gallbladder and the bile duct, would happen two months later.

After researching the survival fee for pancreatic most cancers, Charles feared this wait time was a danger so determined to go personal for the remainder of his remedy by means of his spouse’s Bupa medical cowl.

Only one week later, his operation was carried out on the London Clinic Hospital utilizing a Da Vinci surgical robotic.

“I used to be principally instructed to say goodbye to my spouse, as a result of the operation comes with numerous danger,” Charles mentioned.

“So it was very onerous once we each went into the pre-med room as a result of I didn’t know if I used to be going to get up from this main operation.

“However fortunately for me, simply after I was saying goodbye, they’d simply injected me with the pre-med and subsequent factor I used to be out.”

On April 2, the personal operation concerned making 5 holes in Charles’ stomach, which means there’s much less of an increase of an infection, and Charles was out of hospital 13 days later.

A month after that Charles started six months of fortnightly chemotherapy classes, which led to his weight dropping to only round 67kg – earlier than his prognosis he was round 85kg. “I seemed skeletal,” Charles mentioned.

“However I managed to stay it out. With numerous onerous work, you need to combat it, it’s a battle.”

After the chemo, a scan discovered no cases of latest tumours till – in the beginning of 2020 – one other scan revealed dots on his proper lung and a lymph node swelling near his aorta.

By August 2020, the dots had grown into 10-millimetre tumours, so Charles had a lung ablation – a surgical remedy the place a probe is inserted which can destroy the tumour with excessive warmth or chilly.

The lymph node remedy was extra difficult as commonplace radiotherapy would have additionally touched Charles’ aorta and there was a danger of it rupturing.

As an alternative, at the start of October, Charles was handled at Genesis Care in Oxford with a brand new expertise, MRIdian Linac – a directed radiotherapy utilizing an MRI system so collateral injury is minimised.

After 5 one-hour classes over two weeks, the lymph node tumour was gone and there was no injury to Charles’ aorta, which means Charles’ life might lastly return to regular in addition to the three-month check-up scans.

At this level, Charles determined to dedicate his life, in addition to his work and household, to pancreatic most cancers campaigning, becoming a member of Pancreatic Most cancers UK and turning into a pancreatic most cancers affected person consultant for Genesis Care.

Nevertheless, in Might 2022, a CT scan revealed his pancreatic most cancers had returned in a secondary type.

At this stage, there isn’t any remedy for his situation, however Charles’ oncologist put him again on chemotherapy with two new medicine, one in all which isn’t out there on the NHS.

After three months of remedy the tumours continued to develop and, in September, Charles started one other spherical of chemotherapy fortnightly.

He’ll discover out if this remedy has shrunk his tumour later this month.

On his go to to parliament, he and others will communicate individually to between 60 and 80 MPs who’ve signed as much as the Pancreatic Most cancers UK initiative as a part of their No Time To Wait marketing campaign.

“Our position is to inform our story, principally, to teach them to allow them to perceive we want extra investments,” he mentioned.

Reflecting on his expertise with most cancers, Charles mentioned: “Combating most cancers is greater than combating it bodily, it’s psychological.

“You must think about all of the positivity, you will get out of it.

“I’ve travelled everywhere in the world in my job and have been to locations that folks would have dreamt of going, and I took that as a right.

“However going by means of most cancers places your complete life into perspective.”