ILLOGAN WOMAN PRAISES CAMPAIGN AFTER HER SIGHT IS SAVED (Julia Goldsworthy)

Julia Goldsworthy <info@juliagoldsworthy.org>

ILLOGAN WOMAN PRAISES CAMPAIGN AFTER HER SIGHT IS SAVED

November 9, 2009 3:00 PM

Dorothy Sykes with Julia

A retired nurse from Illogan has thanked her local MP Julia Goldsworthy for campaigning to make the drug Lucentis available on the NHS in Cornwall after the treatment saved her sight.

Dorothy Sykes contracted wet macular degeneration in February - an eye condition that had left both her mother and brother blind. But unlike them, Dorothy had access to the drug Lucentis, which is now available on the NHS in Cornwall following a long-running campaign.

Until last year, access to the drug was limited. Patients who went private had to pay up to £18,000 for treatment. But for Dorothy, the NHS treatment has meant her sight is restored, and now she can read her favourite detective novels again.

She said: "I am grateful for Julia for all her help in campaigning to make Lucentis available on the NHS in Cornwall. Before this treatment, I was practically blind, but now I can see to read again. It's wonderful! I can't tell you how nice it is to have my sight back after nearly a year of deterioration. The first thing I did was picked up a copy of Rumpole and sat down in my chair to read it."

Dorothy, a former chairman of Carn Brea Parish Council and a governor of Barncoose Primary School, said that when her mother and brother contracted wet macular degeneration, there was no treatment available on the NHS. She was one of a number of constituents who contacted Julia about the issue. Julia responded by taking the issue up with the Primary Care Trust and Ministers.

Julia said: "I am obviously delighted that Dorothy's treatment has been so successful, and pleased that Lucentis is now available to all patients on the NHS in Cornwall. There are around 26,000 cases of wet macular degeneration each year in Britain, and it is simply unacceptable that poorer people should be forced to choose between blindness and bankruptcy.

"But this is only a small victory in the wider battle for fair funding for our NHS in Cornwall, which still suffers from an unfair funding formula that penalises rural areas. Along with other MPs in Cornwall I will continue to fight to ensure our health provision is on a par with the rest of the country."