I was told I was too young to have cancer

24-YEAR-OLD HAS MASTECTOMY AFTER 'DELAYED' DIAGNOSIS

- SOPHIE HALLE-RICHARDS

A WOMAN claims she may not have had to undergo life-changing surgery if doctors had not dismissed her as being 'too young to have cancer.

Alicia Mcgoogan was 23 when she started feeling pain in her and discomfort in her right breast in December 2021. At first, she put it down to it being her time of the month.

But then the recruiter, from Manchester, noticed her nipple had started leaking a yellow-sticky discharge. She booked in with her GP and was transferred to a breast clinic at Burnley General Teaching Hospital.

A blockage in her milk duct was identified so she had a microdochectomy to remove the duct in January 2022, and discovered it was a benign tumour.

After the procedure, Alicia expected to get the all-clear. But afterwards, she says she mentioned to a nurse that she'd felt a lump on her breast but she claims they didn't examine it and said it was scar tissue from the surgery.

As the lump got bigger, Alicia claims she pushed for further scans, and after a mammogram and biopsy, was eventually diagnosed with stage two breast cancer on May 18 last year.