A NORTH-EAST breast cancer survivor is urging people in the region to support a new appeal.

Shirley Gibson helped to launch the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer campaign for Cancer Research UK, which aims to promote the advances in treating the disease and explain how people can help to raise money to fund research.

Mrs Gibson, 58, from Darlington, posed with 11 pink roses for the campaign launch.

"Looking at these pink roses really brings home the fact that each flower represents a woman from the North of England who will today discover she has breast cancer," she said.

"I am living proof that there are effective treatments for the disease."

She was diagnosed with cancer in 1990 after her GP found a small lump - the size of a pea - in her breast.

Further tests confirmed she had breast cancer, she had a mastectomy and took the drug tamoxifen for eight years before she had the all-clear.

"I felt terrible when I discovered I had the disease," she said. "There is a history of breast cancer in my family and I feared the worst."

Her younger sister, Ann, died in 1975, aged 27, of breast cancer and her cousin, Frieda, aged 34, died of the disease soon afterwards.

Mrs Gibson is determined to help other sufferers and is an active member of the Darlington and Teesdale Breast Cancer Support Group.

People can back the campaign by organising pink-themed events.

For more information about supporting the campaign, contact 0870 160 2040.