Thanks for saving my life

When Pam MacNaughton was diagnosed with breast cancer five years ago her world didn’t stop … within three months she was back at work, serving drinks at 30,000 feet in the sky.

Pam, who has lived and worked in Bahrain for 23 years, was treated here and believes that she received the best possible care.

She said: “My Bahraini doctors were absolutely fantastic. The treatment was as good if not better then I would have received had I gone home to Liverpool.

“I could turn around and say I’ve been lucky but I’m sure the doctors had a lot to do with it.”

But she also says that Bahrain desperately needs to establish support groups to help breast cancer victims cope with the disease.

Pam, 44, a Gulf Air flight safety and quality assurance coordinator, was diagnosed with breast cancer by doctors at Salmaniya hospital. A lumpectomy was conducted and some lymph nodes from under her arm were removed for testing. The day after the operation her surgeon confirmed she had cancer.

“I just sat there stunned and he came and put his arm around me,” she said. “I was on the pill, I was 39, I hadn’t had a baby, I drank and I smoked. I thought I was just asking for it. But cancer knows no boundaries, it doesn’t matter how good or healthy you are.”

Pam spent a week at Salmaniya recovering after the operation.

“I won’t have a bad word said about Salmaniya. Everyone was brilliant, the nurses were lovely and doctors were great,” she said.

Because the cancer was discovered in its earliest stage Pam did not have to go through chemotherapy, but for the next six weeks she had radiotherapy five days a week for one minute everyday.

“If I was in the UK I would have had to drive three hours from home to get treatment, here it was very convenient,” she said.

Fighting cancer can be an incredibly lonely experience but for Pam going back to the UK was never an option. Bahrain is “home”, she explained.

However, she felt the kingdom lacked the after-care only a support groups can provide.

“Someone from the church came to visit me when I was in hospital but that was it. I was on the phone everyday to my mother who had a friend who was recovering from cancer and if I had a question I would get my mother to ask her to ask it at her next meeting. I got my support from home but there really should be something here.”

As Pam started to recover a friend and Gulf Air colleague who had also been diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 39 and treated in Bahrain provided much-needed support.

She said: “I found out I had breast cancer just as she stopped wearing a wig. She had a mastectomy and chemo here and she would call me every so often and ask how I was. It was very supportive.”

Sadly, a year after Pam finished her treatment, her friend’s cancer had spread to her liver and she passed away.

“Even to this day, I will be driving along and something will trigger a memory and I’ll start crying,” she said.

Today another friend and Gulf Air colleague is also being treated in Bahrain for breast cancer. They often talk about their experiences and have become sources of strength for one another.

“My friend thought she had found another lump last week, and it’s scary, but we ended up laughing about it,” she said.

Pam is a committee member of Bahrain’s breast cancer charity Think Pink and hopes that through the organisation’s work they will be able to help people battling breast cancer who need someone to talk to.

“If you talk to someone who has been through it, it can be very helpful,” she said. “You can build up a network of survivors who can help each other.”