Ray of hope from America

Health Correspondent Barry Nelson talks to a patient who is cheating death.

LENNY Kirk was midway through his cancer treatment when the specialist broke the news. The tumours in his right lung and chest had reduced in size as a result of chemotherapy and radiotherapy but the cancer was still growing.

"I was told before the treatment ended that they couldn't cure it. It was too big. It had been growing for five years," says Lenny, a former chemical tanker driver from Stockton. "They said I should carry on with the treatment, but after that they reckoned I had a four to six month life-span. I remember thinking I'm not going to see another Christmas."

While Lenny tried to take in the awful news, his determined wife Debora was on the Internet, desperately searching for an another way of treating her husband's illness.

By sheer luck she stumbled on the website address of Dr Gil Lederman, director of the Radiation Oncology programme at Staten Island University Hospital in New York.

What jumped out at Debora from the computer screen was the claim that the 'vast majority of cancer treatments at Staten Island University Hospital with body radiosurgery - 95 per cent - are successful'. Even more impressive was the phrase 'frequently these cancers were considered to be untreatable'.

What was more the new treatment, called fractionated stereotactic body radiosurgery, was offered on an outpatient basis and was quicker, less toxic and more convenient than most other cancer treatments.

Hopes raised, the Teesside couple rang up Dr Lederman's department on the other side of the Atlantic. The efficient medical secretary took down all Lenny's details and asked them to send recent hospital scans so Dr Lederman could decide whether he could help them.

Within a few days they got a phone call. "They said 'we are pleased to say we can treat your tumours with a 95 per cent chance of success'.

"It was unbelievable. I was going to die and they are telling me they can treat it," recalls Lenny.

The father-of-four's doctors were sceptical but told him it was up to him and his family whether they were prepared to take a gamble. Apart from the prospect of a leap into the unknown, the main stumbling block was the cost of the private treatment - around £22,000.

"I was broke, I had lost my job, my house and car had been repossessed and my wife had to stop work to look after me, where was I going to get money like that?" says Lenny.

Then something amazing happened to Lenny, a former pub and club doorman.

"I was quite well known around Stockton and when the word got out that I needed to raise all that money all the landlords and bouncers started collections for me. I handed out 48 collection buckets and before I knew it I was doing fund-raising events."

Staggered by the response from his friends in the trade and local drinkers, Lenny soon hit the target. "In the end I raised £22,500. It was brilliant, I haven't go the words to thank everybody. It was overwhelming."

Before he knew it, Lenny was on the plane and then under a million-volt linear accelerator.

Dr Lederman gave Lenny five treatment sessions, involving five short bursts of high-power radiation. Body radiosurgery involves pinpoint precision, using multiple radiation beams from many different angles - all directed at the cancer.

While the patient's exposure to radiation is higher than in conventional radiotherapy, Dr Lederman says it is so precisely targeted on the tumour the surrounding healthy tissue is left unaffected. Once the tumours are located by MRI and CT scanners, a custom-made bodyframe is constructed to keep the patient in position during treatment.

Back home in Stockton, Lenny had to wait for four months before his American doctors could decide whether the treatment had worked. After more scans in the UK were sent to Staten Island hospital, Lenny got the phone call he was hoping for.

"They said they were very pleased. 'You are in remission'," says Lenny.

His family and friends thought that was the end of the story but there was a dramatic new twist when doctors at North Tees Hospital discovered a dangerous new tumour on Lenny's lungs during a scan. Lenny spoke to Dr Lederman's team. "The Americans said 'come back out, we can treat you again - but this time we will only charge you $5,000'."

Somehow Lenny managed to scrape together the extra cash, helped by further donations, and within ten days he was back at Staten Island hospital. After another five radiosurgery sessions Lenny returned to Teesside last Sunday.

"They are pleased with my health, they are predicting an 80 to 90 per cent probability that it won't come back for between one and 15 years," he says.

Now looking forward to his third Christmas with his family since he was given a virtual death sentence, Lenny can hardly believe his luck. "I was supposed to be dead two years ago but look at me now, I'm alive, I have had no NHS treatment since November 2001, I am not on any drugs or tablets, it's fantastic."

A few weeks before Lenny left New York, Dr Lederman mentioned that he was coming to London to give a series of talks about his work. As an old friend of the owner of the Tall Trees Hotel in Yarm, Lenny suggested that if Dr Lederman wanted to add the North-East to his itinerary he could probably provide a good venue.

The New York specialist immediately agreed and is due to speak at the Yarm venue at midday this Sunday.

Since he got back Lenny has been frantically phoning, faxing and spreading the word about the meeting. While Lenny is particularly keen to see doctors and nurses with an interest in cancer treatment at the talk he also wants to see patients, their families and their friends.

He is backed by relatives of North-East patients treated by Dr Lederman, including Norman Wright from near Thirsk, Redcar councillor Sheelagh Clarke and Debbie Gale from Ingleby Barwick.

Norman, whose late wife Christine had treatment for advanced sarcoma in America, is convinced that his wife would still be alive if Britain had the kind of technology available to Dr Lederman.

He said it was 'fantastic news' that Dr Lederman has inquired about the possibility of coming to the UK to treat NHS patients on a part-time basis.

While Dr Lederman's website is impressive - and the Staten Island cancer unit is where ex-Beatle George Harrison chose to seek treatment as a last resort - some UK doctors urge caution.

Professor Michele Saunders, a clinical oncology expert with the Cancer Research UK charity, said Dr Lederman's work 'looks very interesting' but she expressed concern that none of the results appeared to be published in a recognised 'peer-reviewed' medical journal.

And Dr Anil Gholkar, a consultant neuroradiologist at Newcastle General Hospital and a regional representative of the Royal College of Radiologists, stressed that the North-East had 'state-of-the-art' radiotherapy facilities.

Dr Lederman is unfazed by scepticism about body radiosurgery expressed by other doctors around the world. "It is a relatively new technique and in general most doctors are very traditional and conservative. I am coming to the UK to show our techniques and talk about treatment options and physicians, patients and families are welcome to attend. Once people see the effects of body radiosurgery they realise how beneficial it can be."

Dr Lederman stressed that not everyone is suitable for treatment, some are just too ill. "But I think the technology will march on. I believe this is something that could be available to everybody."

* To book a place at the Tall Trees this Sunday ring (01642) 800246.