Hello, my name is Martin Brown, I am 55 years old, married to Wendy and we have 2 daughters, Emma (27) and Lauren (25), and a blind old Jack Russell, Stella, and Reggie the cat.

In January 2017, I was unexpectedly diagnosed with neuroendocrine cancer, the primary being in my pancreas, secondary in my liver.  I had been suffering from stomach aches for some time and had lost weight but we all thought it was a reoccurrence of a hernia. We never thought it would be cancer. 

Being told that this cancer was not curable but could be treated and managed was hard to take. The shock of this revelation hit me and my family hard and in the early days it was difficult to accept and take it all on board. This is where NCUK was so helpful. The website was full of really useful information about this relatively unknown cancer, and it was explained in plain easy-to-understand English. At the time there was a lot of medical jargon to take in, and this website was a blessing to help unpack the information and made me feel a little less overwhelmed.  

So far, my story has been one mainly of positivity.  My NET is “non-functional” and I am fortunate to be currently fit and well.  Dr Seb Cummins at the Royal Surrey County Hospital, Guildford is my consultant and I cannot fault the level of care, compassion and treatment that I have received.  Initially, I was told surgery was not an option as I had too many tumours on my liver (grades 2 & 3),  but after 2 courses of chemotherapy, these shrunk considerably and I was able to have 2 operations within 6 weeks of each other to remove them successfully.  Last year, I needed more chemo as 2 further tumours had reappeared, but my op was cancelled with a day’s notice when the MRI showed the tumours had disappeared!  However, a year later, these likely residual tumours have reappeared, and I am due to have surgery in September to remove them.

Although the last 3 years has been an emotional rollercoaster for me and my family, with the success of the previous chemo treatment and operations, my oncologist said that we were “kicking the can further down the road”. I will continue to give that can as big a kick as possible! 

In October, I was supposed to be taking part in an extreme off-road 50-mile South Downs charity cycle challenge (which had been moved from May due to Covid).  However, due to my impending op, I can’t now participate.  So….. I now plan to do the challenge before my op just with my bike buddy Stuart. We plan to ride the full 50 miles and keep to the original route as much as possible.

We will be attempting this tough challenge (elevation – 5,010ft / 1,527m = lots and lots of hills!!) on Saturday, 12th September to raise money for NCUK. 
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/martin-wendy-brown