Revealed: The bowel cancer breakthrough that could save young sufferers - and the signs doctors can miss By Luke Chafer Published: 06:55 EDT, 8 September 2024 | Updated: 06:57 EDT, 8 September 2024 e-mail View comments A bowel cancer treatment that gives hope to people with the same aggressive form that hit Dame Deborah James has been approved for use on the NHS . The drug combination – two medicines called trifluridine-tipiracil hydrochloride and bevacizumab – will be introduced following a US trial which found that for patients who had run out of treatment options it bought nearly an extra year of life. And in some rare cases, it gave patients up to seven more years.
Experts say it is a significant step in the fight against the BRAF V6004E mutation, an incurable genetic form of bowel cancer which often affects the young. Dame Deborah James had the aggressive BRAF mutation. Under the name Bowelbabe, the deputy headteacher went on to build up a massive social media following A blood sample taken as part of testing for the mutation.
Most sufferers do not live longer than ten months after diagnosis Of the 42,000 Britons diagnosed with bowel cancer every year, about one in ten carry the BRAF mutation. Chemotherapy and other medicines quickly become ineffective, and most sufferers do not live longer than ten months after diagnosis. Dame Deborah was just 35 in 2016 when she was diagnosed with BRAF bowel cancer .
Under the name Bowelbabe, the deputy headteacher went on to bui.