Published: Wednesday, 27th August, 2008 12:30pm

Vaccine might have saved my daughter's life

by Nicola Findlay

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Dollar mum urges girls to take up HPV immunisation offer

SHelley Burgin, from Dollar, was just 27 when she died from cervical cancer, and now her family are encouraging young girls to take up a vaccine which offers protection against the viruses which cause the majority of cervical cancer cases.
Pic by: Burgin family

A FAMILY devastated by the untimely death of a treasured wife, daughter and sister are backing a Government immunisation programme to help protect girls against cervical cancer.

Shelley Burgin, who lived just outside Dollar, died from cervical cancer in March of last year aged just 27, only nine months after her diagnosis.

She worked as an occupational therapist at Dundee’s Ninewells Hospital and had regular cervical smear tests but, unfortunately, the cancer wasn’t detected.

Her mum Denise now wants to make sure as many girls as possible are given the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccine so that Shelley’s death won’t be in vain.

The jabs will be offered to schoolgirls aged 12-13, and will guard against the HPV, which is responsible for 70 per cent of cervical cancer cases.

Denise told the Advertiser, “When Shelley was told she had advanced cervical cancer we were absolutely devastated – she was a newly married young woman, a graduate and post-graduate who worked in the NHS and had all her future in front of her.

“She was a beautiful, lively, healthy girl who loved sport, went to the gym regularly, didn’t smoke and loved life.”

Shelley married her husband Matt in October 2005 but eight months later she started bleeding irregularly and visited her GP, who assumed her contraceptive pill needed to be changed.

However, the bleeding continued and after a visit to another GP she was given a repeat smear test, although her last one in November 2005 had been normal.

She even asked for a referral to a consultant gynaecologist but this was bypassed and eventually her mum organised a private appointment.

Denise went on, “She rang me from the hospital where she worked in desperation on 22 June 2006, the bleeding was so bad she was having great difficulty continuing to work. I immediately arranged a private appointment for the following Monday.

“It was a beautiful sunny day when I dropped her at the railway station to catch the train to Dundee for the appointment. Her husband Matt was meeting her there.

“We, my husband Bernie and myself, were just leaving to join a friend for their birthday celebrations, when the telephone rang. It was Shelley sobbing. ‘Mum, I’ve got cervical cancer,’ she said.

“Nine months later, on 27 March, Shelley died at home. Her husband was with her along with myself and her father and her brother Christian. A wonderful, caring wife, daughter, sister and health professional was gone.

“The course of the illness was unremitting. Her courage and dignity throughout the awful treatment had to be seen to be believed.”

Shelley never worked again from the day she was diagnosed and the intensive chemotherapy and radiotherapy left her feeling extremely sick and caused her hair to fall out. The treatment was also very intrusive and Shelley had to endure having radium rods inserted into her vagina.

“There were setbacks at every stage – contracting MRSA following an epidural procedure for pain relief which delayed the chemotherapy and her kidneys failing. But throughout everything she smiled, was courteous and always concerned for others,” said Denise.

Having trained as a general nurse, Denise was aware of cervical cancer but never dreamed it would kill her seemingly fit and healthy daughter and feels its vital to raise awareness of the disease, often dubbed the silent killer.

“If I had been asked to rank out of 100 diseases what my 27-year- old daughter Shelley would die of in 21st century Britain, cervical cancer would have possibly been number 99, certainly in the bottom 10. It is important to know that this cancer can affect the least likely of people,” she said.

“If only Shelley could have had this new vaccine I feel pretty certain that, along with cervical smears, she could still be alive today and I would urge every parent to remember they will be protecting their daughter.”

The immunisation programme is launched next month with the HPV vaccine being offered to around 30,000 schoolgirls, with school nurses giving out three jabs over a six month period.

For girls who have left school, and are aged up to 17, there will be a catch-up campaign and girls will be contacted by NHS Forth Valley to make an appointment for the jabs.