WHEN Rob Horton’s GP dismissed his digestive problems as nothing more sinister than acid reflux brought on by work stress, the dad-of-three took him at his word and soldiered on.
For aged 47, the super-active builder was otherwise healthy and appeared too young to fit the mould of anyone with a more serious condition.
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Yet less than a year later, after collapsing at his home on Valentine’s Day, he was diagnosed with advanced oesophageal cancer.
Four years on, in March this year, Rob died aged just 51.
Now it’s become his wife Maria’s mission to make sure no one else with similar symptoms is dismissed simply because of their age.
As she gears up for her family’s first Christmas without him, not a day goes by when Maria, 53, doesn’t wish he couldn’t be by her side, or sitting next to her at the dinner table.
She admits: “Rob loved Christmas. He was just a big kid really and I still can’t believe he’s not here.
“It took me ages to put the Christmas lights up this year because that was what he loved to do.
“I’m not sure we can sit around the table eating Christmas dinner.
“We’ll have to eat on our laps because it’s too obvious that Rob is missing.”
She adds: “The GP didn’t see the red flags. He dismissed Rob as having indigestion, saying he was too fit and too young, at 47, to have anything else.
“But cancer doesn’t care how young you are or how fit you are.
“Oesophageal cancer is all too often seen as an older person’s disease, or something that only older people who smoke or drink get.
“But I speak to plenty of people on the forums who have it in their 30s and 40s and don’t do those things.”
The loving couple were married for 29 years and raised three children, Caidan, 28, Rhianna, 25, and Rowan, 22 at their seaside home near Newquay, in Cornwall.
They also doted on their granddaughter, Dorothy, now two, who called Rob “Pingu” because of his love for penguins.
The outdoor-lover first felt something was wrong in June 2019.
Rob showed so many red flags that they should have warranted more testing but doctors accused him of making it up
Maria
Maria explains: “He went to the doctor because it felt different when he was eating.
“He described it as feeling like a piece of bread was stuck in his throat, so he kept drinking water to try to wash things down.
“He was also getting a nagging pain in his stomach after eating.”
Despite his symptoms, Rob’s GP dismissed them as minor and attributed them to stress, ruling out anything like cancer because he was under 55, and it seemed so unlikely.
Over eight months, Rob visited the doctor’s surgery at least eight times.
By Christmas 2019, he could barely swallow solid foods and had lost two stone, yet his concerns were repeatedly downplayed.
Maria says: “The first doctor sent him home with some Omeprazole for acid reflux and wrote in his notes that it could be caused by work stress.
“Then all the other GPs he saw just went with the first diagnosis.
“In fact, Rob showed so many red flags that they should have warranted more testing.
“Rob trusted his doctor knew best, but he came out of those appointments so upset.
“He said, ‘They think I’m making this up. I know there’s something wrong, but no one believes me.’”
TIPPING POINT
The tipping point came on Valentine’s Day 2020, when Rob collapsed at home.
“By then, he couldn’t keep anything down, not even water,” Maria recalls.
“He began vomiting what looked like ground coffee – which I now know was dried blood.”
Paramedics took Rob to the Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro.
Doctors initially believed he had a stomach ulcer.
After extensive tests, Rob was dealt the devastating news that he had oseophageal adenocarcinoma, a rare type of cancer that affects the food pipe and had already reached stage 4A.
Ever the optimist, Rob faced his diagnosis with determination.
Maria says: “He told the doctors, ‘Just do whatever you’ve got to do. Chop it out’, but they explained that surgery was only possible if the tumour could be shrunk first.
“I think I was just in shock because I’d just thought it was a stomach ulcer too.”
The warning signs of oesophageal cancer
OESOPHAGEAL cancer is a cancer of the food pipe.
It affects 9,400 people in the UK every year, and most people are over the age of 60.
Smoking increases your risk of the disease, as does being overweight, drinking alcohol and having conditions like Barrett’s oesophagus, where the cells lining your oesophagus have become abnormal.
Only 12 per cent of patients survive for 10 or more years after being diagnosed.
There are around 8,000 oesophageal cancer deaths in the UK every year – or 22 every day.
Early diagnosis is key, so recognising the symptoms is vital. The most common include:
- Difficulty swallowing
- Unexplained weight loss
- Indigestion or heartburn that doesn’t go away
- Pain in the throat or behind the breastbone
But some people also experience a cough, hoarseness, dark poo, tiredness and food coming back up after swallowing.
Source: Cancer Research UK
He started chemotherapy in March 2020, on the same day their youngest son Rowan turned 18.
Maria says: “Rob told Rowan he had to have his first pint at the pub, so I took him down while Rob was having his treatment.
“That was Rob, through and through. Life had to go on and he didn’t want the kids being upset.
“The chemo took it out of him but he never complained.
“We always tried to get to the coast straight after.
“The sea was really healing for Rob. It also gave him a chance to process everything.
“We walked a lot of the coastline he loved.”
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Despite the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic, Rob’s treatment continued uninterrupted.
The chemo worked, shrinking the tumour enough for surgery.
In June 2020, he underwent an eight-hour operation to remove the tumour at Derriford Hospital in Plymouth.
Surgeons cut out two-thirds of his oesophagus and a third of his stomach.
Maria remembers: “I dropped him off, not knowing if or when I’d see him again.
“To cope, I stress-painted our front door while waiting for news.”
The surgery was deemed a success, and Rob recovered well, even returning to work in outdoor education.
But in 2021, the cancer returned in two lymph nodes.
‘Rob was all about living life to the fullest’
Knowing it was incurable, Rob focused on his bucket list, visiting Scotland, Wales, and many other places he’d always dreamed of seeing.
“We went to Loch Ness, because obviously Nessie is real,” Maria laughs.
“We went to the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo show and saw the puffins on Skomer Island off the coast of West Wales.
“Rob was all about living life to the fullest.”
By late 2022, the cancer had spread further, and Rob began more chemo and palliative radiotherapy.
Maria recalls their dark humour helping them through, especially on Valentine’s Day 2023 when Rob filled out a ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ form.
She says: “He looked at me and said, ‘Well, you told me you wanted to make Valentine’s more memorable,’ and we both started laughing.
“The nurse didn’t know what to do!”
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Rob’s health declined rapidly in early 2024.
After a final family trip to Portsmouth to see HMS Victory, he became bed-bound.
On March 6, surrounded by Maria, their children, granddaughter Dorothy, and daughter-in-law Alyssa, 25, Rob passed away peacefully at home.
“He had his perfect death because he just wanted to be with us,” Maria says through tears.
“We played his favourite songs – Meatloaf and Passenger. And I read him The Very Hungry Caterpillar because it was a standing joke.
“Whenever someone had a bad day, he’d put an arm around them and read that to them.”
Rob’s ashes are now scattered across some of his favourite places.
It’s too late to help Rob but I hope that sharing my story will help someone else be diagnosed earlier
Maria
Maria says: “He’ll still be travelling, seeing every place he loved.”
This Christmas their home will also pay tribute to him.
Maria says: “Shortly before he died, he made me promise to keep putting up the lights.
“He said, ‘You’re not allowed to keep the house in darkness this Christmas.’
“So, I’ve done it. We even bought an eight-foot inflatable penguin because he loved them so much.”
But she can’t shake the thought that earlier intervention could have saved him.
MARIA’S PLEA
“GPs need better training,” Maria says. “The GP was wrong not to send Rob for tests on the two-week cancer pathway.
“I put in a complaint to the NHS. Now new guidelines for that particular GP surgery are followed that remove age from the list when looking at symptoms.
“Oesophageal cancer was previously only flagged if the patient was over 55.
“It’s too late to help Rob but I hope that sharing my story will help someone else be diagnosed earlier.
“If you feel something’s wrong, push for tests. Early diagnosis is key.
“And if your GP won’t listen, find another one because you know your body better than anyone else.
“So if you feel something is getting stuck, if you are losing weight, if you have persistent heartburn, stomach pain, sickness after eating, anything that’s been bothering you for a few weeks, please get to your GP.”
Fiona Labrooy, chief operating officer at the charity Hearturn Cancer UK, adds: “If issues are found early, something can often be done.
“The people we love don’t die too soon.
“They’re at our Christmas dinner tables and our birthday parties.
“By knowing and reacting to the warning signs, people stay alive.”
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