Thanks for the reply guys. I don't want to open a can of worms here and
we are not looking for compensation, we are looking to make sure that
this does not happen to anyone else as there has be some very poor
medical care during my late fathers illness. The NHS doctor would not
refer him to a speciliast despite sever weight loss and blood from his
rectum. We pleaded from November 04 through to March 05 but the NHS
doctor kept expliaing that my father had some sort of bug that was
doing the rounds and told him to return to work ASAP. My dad attempted
to go to back to work and collapsed with the pain and we had to pay
privatley for my dad to go to private health care specialist named
BUPA. The Bupa "expert" diagnosed with my dad with Colitis and said
that as they had detected now they would remove the cancerous pollups
and this would prevent my father from getting cancer in his later life.
The operation was carried out and my dad was told to take the
prescribed steriods which he did but he was still going to the toilet
every 10-15 minutes and was still loosing weight - orignal 15st 6lbs
now 11st 2lbs!

We contacted Bupa, and they reluctantly agreed to see my dad on the
basis that he paid for the aftercare appointment, wwe paid and they
didnt even examine him, they just prescribed a different course of
steriods which he tried for a furth 3-4 weeks with no effect, but
symptons exactley the same.

We had no alternative but to take my dad to the local NHS hosptial's
A&E department where he eventually got to see a specialist within three
days. The NHS specialist was superb, but he gave us the news we all
didnt want to hear, that my father had Stage IV bowel cancer which had
spread to the lymph nodes and he now had three tumors, one large in the
bowel, one large in the liver and one in the lungs. The agreed to
perform a stoma operation ASAP to relieve his pain and he said that
they would attempt to shrink the tumour in the bowel and then attempt
to remove the tumour as it penetrated the bowel wall with radiation and
would use chemo in attempt to contain the other tumours. This was July
04. My dad went though the chemo, radio treatment and was told in
October that it had not worked and his liver tumor was spreading
quickly and was given 0-6 months life expectancy. My father died on
November 9th 2005.

Our main course for concern was the following:

1. The NHS doctor in November 2004 would refer my father to see a
specialist despite over 8 visits to doctor
2. The Bupa specialist did not examine my dad on the follow appointment

3. The NHS cancer care specialist explained that the original scans
that Bupa had used to diagnosed my father with colitis showed the
tumour in my fathers bowel, and he said that if it was diagnosed then,
there would have a much better chance of quality of life and survival.
He asked if we going to pursue legal action before my dad had the stoma
operation, and we said that it was not the time to think about that as
all we wanted was our dad to be with us. He said that we where right
but we would have a very strong case for medical negligence if we do
decide to go down this route. My father was part of this conversation
and made him very bitter towards the treatment he received, and asked
me to ensure that this never happens to someone else and that is why I
am pursuing this difficult scenario. I would never want this to happen
to anyone else's loved one as I can accept that nothing is 100% and
misdiagnosis happens all the time, but I think that the aftercare here
has been abysmal. Do you think I am being unreasonble?

Thanks for listening,

Kevin