Doctors were urged yesterday to check on their skill at listening to patients after details emerged of a father of three whose tumour went undetected on 22 visits to 12 different doctors. The national cancer "tsar", Mike Richards, said that technical medical improvements would be undermined if GPs or specialists were impatient or dismissive when patients were unclear or found it hard to explain what they felt was wrong.
He admitted that many patients complained that doctors "failed to hear" them, as in the case of Steven Hurley, a 41-year-old South Yorkshire businessman whose tongue cancer is now inoperable.
Mr Hurley was told to "get a life" by one hospital locum after a six-hour wait. He also saw three specialists privately without the condition being diagnosed.
Professor Richards said: "Doctors always need to communicate with patients and hear what they are saying. We need to invest more in communication skills because all too often patients tell us they were not actually heard by their doctor and the way they were treated was not as good as it should have been."
Mr Hurley, a father of three boys aged 11, 10 and six, runs a land surveying practice in Barnsley.
He now faces months of chemotherapy and is likely to lose his tongue, larynx and voicebox if the treatment fails. He described an intense sore throat and ear pains to four GPs, five hospital doctors and the three specialists before the cancer was spotted by a fourth private consultant on his 23rd appointment.
He said yesterday that he was not optimistic about beating the cancer and was thinking of taking legal action against the hospitals.
Although some of his hospital visits were at times of extreme pressure on the health service, including Christmas Eve and Millennium Eve, the saga dragged on between August last year and March when the tumour was recognised.
"I was in so much pain I could hardly speak. Some nights I never slept at all and I lost a couple of stones," he said. His wife Adele, 36, said that once the cancer was diagnosed, she and her husband were given a medical charity's leaflet which spelt out her husband's symptoms simply and exactly.
Barnsley district general hospital, where Mr Harley saw five NHS doctors before booking private appointments, was unapologetic yesterday. The chief executive, Sue James, said: "Senior doctors have looked at his notes very carefully. He was very thoroughly examined and the doctors did a whole range of tests. They could not find any reason for the pain he had got. They gave him painkillers and strongly advised him to talk to his GP. We did everything we needed to do. We have not made any mistakes and there's nothing for us to apologise for."
Gordon McVie, the director general of the Cancer Research Campaign, said: "This case clearly highlights the importance of early detection and the consequences of failing to catch cancers quickly.
"It also underlines the need for patients to demand a diagnosis from their doctors and, if necessary, to get a second opinion."
