Young Mother died from Cervical Cancer after visiting Doctors NINE times

A devastated mother has urged the government to lower the age at which women have smear tests after losing her 22-year-old daughter to cervical cancer.

Jess Evans, from Birmingham, visited her doctor nine times in two months after falling ill in November 2012.

But after being referred for tests at hospital in April last year, doctors were forced to tell the new mother she had terminal cancer.

Miss Evans had repeatedly complained of stomach pain, abnormal bleeding, bloating and feeling tired.

But coming shortly after she gave birth to her son Riley, doctors had said her body was merely getting back to normal after pregnancy.

They told her due to her age, there was ‘no cause for alarm’, refusing a smear test because the national age for screening is 25.

Miss Evans lost her battle with the disease in February this year.

Her death has prompted her mother Marie to campaign for the government to lower the smear test age from 25 to 16.

She believes her daughter would still be alive had she been offered a test.

Mrs Evans made this known while featuring on a programme: ‘“he had not long had a baby when her symptoms appeared.

“That is what they [doctors] were putting it down to, that and her age. She was having bleeding, heavy periods, and she wasn’t feeling very well, really tired all the time.

“She kept going and they kept telling her she was anaemic.

“We really thought something wasn’t right. She went back to the doctors nine times.

“But you never expect the C word, that’s not something you think.

“I went with her. The doctor said because she had just had a baby it was her body getting back to normal again.”

When doctors eventually diagnosed Miss Evans’s cervical cancer they told the 22-year-old she had just 10 months to live.

Recalling her daughter’s diagnosis, Mrs Evans said: “I was frantic, but tried to keep calm for my daughter’s sake.”

Why was the age limit for smear tests raised to 25?  

Dr Dawn Harper also at the same forum said the age limit for smear tests was raised from 20 to 25 after high numbers of young women were receiving treatment they didn’t need.

She said: “The age limit used to be over 20 in England.

“The reasons it was changed was based on National Screening Community, it wasn’t financially driven.

“The cervix systems develop in the early 20s for a lot of women.

“We were getting multiple abnormal smear results for lots of young girls, which were causing anxiety and some were having treatment that wasn’t absolutely necessary, and increased the risk of premature labour or miscarriage if they got pregnant later in life.

“The thinking was cervical cancer is very rare under 25 and so the age of screening should be raised.

“That is awful for you to hear (Mrs Evans).

“It is really important that while we don’t screen under 25s, anyone suffering abnormal bleeding must always, always, report it to their doctor.

“I have a rule of threes, if someone comes back with the same symptoms three times I am not getting it.

“My advice is don’t be scared to ask for a referral for a second opinion.”

“She was absolutely hysterical, I just went numb, I had no words. I don’t actually know how we got home that day.

“You go into this world, a frozen state, I couldn’t think of anything. We didn’t talk about death, she wanted to talk about life.

“None of us had that conversation, we just carried on as normal as we could.

“It was her way of coping.

“We kept going and going, when it came to the end and we knew it was coming that was the worst, I was living with my daughter and I knew it was going to be the last of this the last of that.”

She said the family told baby Riley, now two, that his mummy was poorly.

“He would kiss her tummy,” Mrs Evans said.

“He is always asking for his mummy, especially when he comes to stay with me.”

Miss Evans’s brother James, added: ‘She got that ill, he (Riley) couldn’t cuddle her.

“I think that’s what broke her.”

His mother added: ‘I miss her, I miss her everyday, all of us do.

“It has killed us, it is just not the same without her.”

Mrs Evans is now backing an e-petition calling on Prime Minister David Cameron to lower the age at which women are first offered a smear test - which screens for signs of cervical cancer - from 25 to 16.

Mrs Evans told another meduim: ‘‘I’m not blaming anyone else for the fact she got cancer.

“But she was fobbed off time and time again. She had three bouts of surgery including a hysterectomy.

‘‘She went through blood transfusions, chemotherapy — nothing could be done. She was in constant agony. At the end she was a bag of bones.

‘‘Jess has gone but I don’t want any other mothers like me to have to go through this.’’

She added: ‘‘I want more awareness of cervical cancer, I know every cancer is important, but I want to see leaflets out in hospitals, I want to visit schools, more information about the HPV vaccine.’’

The family have established a charity in Jess’s memory, Jessie’s Wishe.