Aberdeenshire woman with weeks left to live fundraises for "miracle" treatment
Marie Dobson's liver is failing after five rounds of chemotherapy and she needs to raise £35,000 to get a possibly life-saving operation that isn't available on the NHS
Last updated 5th Oct 2021
An Aberdeenshire woman is trying to fundraise £35,000 so she can live to see her birthday in a matter of weeks. Marie Dobson, from Newmachar, has secondary breast cancer that has spread to her bones and liver, but this treatment could cure her.
The most recent round of chemotherapy has been stopped because her liver is failing and doctors say she may not live to see her 39th birthday in November.
The treatment is called Dendrix and can't be done freely on the NHS.
Marie said: "It's quite a quick procedure and it's much less harsh than chemotherapy.
"I can be cured and at the moment I don't know if I'm going to make it to November, so to me that's a miracle."
In 2015 Marie was diagnosed with breast cancer and after around 12 months of treatment she overcame it.
She then wanted to try for children with her partner Neil and was told it may take 3 years before they should, given the hormonal medicine she was given.
In 2019 the couple went back for a scan ahead of trying to start a family, Marie said: "Unfortunately it came back that the cancer had come back. And that it was secondary breast cancer and it had spread through my bones.
"That was a massive shock to me. I didn't know any of the symptoms of secondary breast cancer and I wish I did.
"It makes me angry that I didn't have a clue and nobody warned me that this is what I had to look out for.
"Every bone in my body was covered in cancer.
"It is incurable, and it is terminal, but I'm going to keep living."
Despite her health setbacks the personal trainer continues to work with her clients and is organising a fundraising running event to take place this Sunday 10 October.
The event is at Castle Fraser, Inverurie and is called Run4Marie.
Several events like it have already taken place since Marie set it up in 2019 to raise awareness for secondary breast cancer.
You can view the crowdfunding page here
A spokesperson for the Scottish Medicines Consortium said: “Dendritic cell vaccines are in development for a range of cancer types, but these are unlicensed and none are currently close enough to market to be on our work programme.”