Pensioner Kay Hopkins yesterday delivered a petition to 10 Downing Street pleading for the chance to be given a kidney cancer drug that could save her life. The 70-year-old is currently being denied a programme of £2,100-a-month Sutent on the NHS. Reporter George Oliver accompanied Kay, her husband Paul and family friend Jackie Webb on their heartfelt trip to London

IN THE year the NHS celebrates its 60th birthday a former nurse with more than four decades of service petitioned the Government for the drug that could save her life.

Kay Hopkins knocked on the door of 10 Downing Street yesterday with two supporters by her side, but carried the backing of thousands of well-wishers as she campaigned for the cancer drug Sutent.

The 70-year-old was supported by husband Paul and family friend Jackie Webb, landlady of The Furlong pub in Tunstall, as she delivered the 4,000-name petition calling for funding.

Kay only retired from the NHS two years ago after 42 years' service in Staffordshire at Longton Cottage Hospital, Haywood Hospital and the former Westcliffe Hospital.

Kay, of Willowcroft Way, Harriseahead, said she felt devastated by the response of North Staffordshire Primary Care Trust (PCT) in her own hour of need.

She said: "You are in shock at first and you can't take it in when they first tell you, then you get through the crying and the emotional bit.

"Then you get the anger when you find out the position you are in and that you can't get help, especially when you have been told there is help out there.

"Then you are frustrated because you don't know what to do or where to go. Without help from family and friends I wouldn't have been able to get this far."

She continued: "The battle for the drug has taken my mind off feeling sorry for myself. Getting the Sutent has given me a bit of a purpose and something to focus on rather than the illness.

"I have got nowhere yet but I have got to be optimistic and think that I have got a chance.

"The people of Stoke-on-Trent have been wonderful. The last batch of petitions we were sent had 150 signatures which they had got in one day, and there was a note attached saying 'remember that we want it for you, and that is what we have signed for, but we are hoping to have it for Stoke-on-Trent as well'."

Kay was first diagnosed with kidney cancer in December last year after doctors had spent 16 months trying to get to the bottom of blood pressure problems.

She said: "I was dumbfounded and we came back from Macclesfield Hospital like a couple of zombies.

"We couldn't speak and I remember saying to Paul 'they are not talking about me' because it was so unbelievable.

"They told me I had two years and I asked if it was from when I was diagnosed, but they just said 'how long is a piece of string?'.

"I asked if that was it and if they could not help me any more but he told me there was a new wonder drug that had 50 to 60 per cent results and I thought I was the right candidate.

"But he said he was sorry to tell us that our PCT does not fund it, that we would have a battle and it would be very, very hard."

Kay, who is currently reluctant to face the strain of a court case, added: "You can't believe that if your PCT has a life-saving drug it is going to refuse you it.

"I believed in the NHS and if anyone had told me that the NHS would do this to anybody – not just to me – I would not have believed them in a million years.

"When I looked after those elderly people I knew they were somebody's mother or somebody's grandmother and I always treated the patients as though they were members if my own family.

"I would say to the people at the PCT what if they were in my shoes?"

The PCT has argued Kay is not an exceptional enough case to warrant a programme of Sutent, which is yet to be approved by the National Institute For Health And Clinical Excellence (Nice)

A Department Of Health spokesman said Nice was created as an independent body to advise the NHS on which treatments are both clinically and cost effective and should therefore be available for all patients.

But he added: "Sometimes Nice has to say no to a treatment because the evidence does not support its use in the NHS.

"We recognise that when Nice has to say no there are implications for patients and their carers.

"These are not easy recommendations for any body to make."

Nobody at NHS North Staffordshire was available for comment.