Kate Bartholomew

After several months of pain, which began in late 2016, and most of the usual tests, I was diagnosed with bowel cancer and had emergency surgery in Leeds in March the following year. One of the subsequent scans revealed aggressive breast cancer, so my 2017 birthday present was a lumpectomy. I thought the subsequent "mopping up" chemotherapy would be the end of the bowel cancer, but the chemo was ineffective and I had another operation in 2018. Radiotherapy has been used three times: once after the lumpectomy and twice for subsequent bowel cancer tumours. Luckily it is not Lynch Syndrome, but my sporadic DNA mismatch repair deficient cancer is still lurking - somewhere.

I retired from being a peripatetic adult tutor three years before my state pension age, to spend what time I had left on subjects close to my heart. I want to be  able to help with clear, simple communication of complex matters and with encouraging people to use all the free screening they can.