Eilish Flanagan of Rayleigh, Essex in England, is trying to raise awareness of germ cell cancer after her three-year-old daughter Aoife Flanagan-Gibbs was misdiagnosed with constipation in June and died the next month.
The toddler felt pain in her stomach, along with other parts of her body, so Flanagan brought her to a doctor, who told her that she was simply suffering from constipation despite a visible tumor on her bottom. She said "I took her to see the [general practitioner] or a consultant doctor 11 times in three weeks. She'd been in and out of [the] hospital with different infections and problems, but they kept telling us she had common child constipation."
According to Flanagan, she was even accused by doctors of not feeding her daughter properly and when she continued to bring up her worries, they allegedly dismissed her. While waiting for a hospital transfer, Flanagan and her family received an X-ray scan revealing a tumor in her liver, which blocked her bowel.
At the second hospital, the doctors discovered that Aoife acutally had germ cell cancer. According to Children with Cancer UK, this disease is caused by a malignant tumor normally found in the ovary or testis and only comprises approximately 3% of childhood cancer registrations in the United Kingdom.
Aoife died on July 7 and doctors said it was because her diagnosis was too late. Flanagan donated her daughter's organs, tissues and tumors for research.
To raise awareness of the disease, she created, through a GoFundMe campaign, Aoife's Bubbles, a charity that educates others about the effects of germ cell cancer and supports those with the disease. Flanagan said Aoife loved her pony named Bubbles, from which the charity got its name.
Less than a month prior to Aoife's case and the awareness campaign, another three-year-old girl also died from germ cell cancer after similarly being misdiagnosed with constipation.
