Family call for change in cervical cancer screening age as mum, 25, dies after year-long battle with disease
A YOUNG mum has died after battling cervical cancer for a year.
Her family are now calling for recommended age for women to have smear tests lowered to help detect cancer in young women earlier, and prevent other families suffering the same heartache.
Sadie Blackston, 25, was diagnosed with the disease in January 2016 and initially underwent chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
But she was later given the devastating news the cancer had spread to her cervical lymph nodes and was no longer treatable,
It was so aggressive that it ate through part of her bowel and she had to have a colostomy bag and a catheter.
The mum-of-four died on Tuesday at her mum's home in Meopham, Kent, where she grew up.
Sadie was surrounded by family and friends.
Her sister, Lizzie Blackston, 23, said: "She was a lovely person and a very loving mum, sister, daughter, auntie and friend.
"Everyone loved Sadie. I'm lost for words to be honest. We are all devastated, ripped apart. She will never be forgotten."
Lizzie claims Sadie, from Gravesend, visited her GP several times complaining of pain and bleeding but, despite her family history of cervical cancer, she was sent away with pain killers and not offered a smear test.
But then, she collapsed and was rushed to hospital where she was diagnosed with cervical cancer.
The current recommended age for women to have a pap smear is 25 but many people think that age should be lowered.
Lizzie is one of those people, and thinks it should be lowered to 16 because that's when women can legally have sex.
Smear tests are a preventative test used to detect abnormal cells on the cervix – the entrance to the womb from the vagina.
Detecting these cells and then removing them can prevent cervical cancer.
Cervical screening is carried out under the NHS Cervical Screening Programme, which was introduced in the 1980s.
Every woman over the age of 25 who has a GP is invited for screening – and it doesn’t matter if you’re sexually active or not.
How often you need a cervical screening test depends on your age.
Women aged 25-49 are invited every three years, women aged 50-64 every five years and women over 65 are only invited if they haven’t been screened since they were 50, or if they have any recent abnormal test results.
But Lizzie believes Sadie's cancer would have been detected earlier if she had been given a smear test.
Sadie's family knew her cancer was terminal, but Lizzie said they weren't prepared for how quickly she deteriorated in her last few days.
She added: "She was OK on Saturday. She was sitting up and she ate a bit of chicken kebab.
"But by Sunday she was very poorly and we couldn't understand what she was saying."
On Tuesday a nurse visited Sadie at home and told mum, Leanne Limes, that she was unlikely to make it through the night.
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Now her family and friends are crowdfunding for Sadie's funeral.
They are hoping to raise £2,000.
Earlier this year Sadie's friends raised more than £1,000 so Sadie could take her four children on a trip to Disney Land and make memories, but she was too ill to make the trip.
Sadie leaves behind sister Iesha Jarvis, 26, brothers Reece Blackston, 24, and Nazir Dillon, 11, and her children Morgan, seven, Kenzie, five, Ellisia, four and Harvey, two.
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