Source: www.mirror.co.uk
Author: Amber Hicks

Ryan Greenan went to his doctor in Edinburgh in September after he started having trouble swallowing, eating and drinking.

The 35-year-old from Scotland was advised his symptoms were most likely caused by reflux and anxiety, reports the Scotsman , despite his family having a history of throat cancer.

Ryan’s sister Kerry, 33, said her brother took this diagnosis at face value “because the general advice was that oesophageal cancer only really affected older people”.

However, the symptoms persisted and Ryan started to rapidly lose weight before collapsing at work in December. 

He was taken to hospital and it was then that a tumour was discovered in his throat and he was diagnosed with cancer on December 28.

There was more heartache when it was revealed it had also spread to his lungs and liver and there was nothing that could be done to save him.

Three weeks later Ryan sadly died.

His sister is now calling on doctors to thoroughly test for the illness, even in younger patients.

Kerry told the Scotsman : “When Ryan first went to the doctor, he was told it was anxiety and that he was too young for it to be cancer because he was only 35.

“He just took that as his diagnosis and didn’t go back because the general advice was that oesophageal cancer only really affected older people.

“If it had been picked up earlier, they could have operated, they could have given him chemotherapy, but after three months it had spread, there was nothing else they could do at that point.

“I’m just absolutely destroyed. I’m so angry. If they had caught it earlier, my big brother would still be here today.”

It was while Ryan, who has two daughters aged eight and 11, was receiving treatment that he proposed to partner Natasha Robertson, 35, on January 11.

Heartbroken Natasha told the Evening Telegraph : “Ryan was my soulmate. We were together for eight months and he just made me so happy during such a short time.”