SWINDON CANCER APPEAL: Former speedway star Barry Duke has plenty to thank Macmillan nurses for, as he told TAMASH LAL

WHEN former speedway superstar Barry Duke noticed a strange lump on his neck while shaving he knew exactly what to do he asked his boss to examine it.

Barry is a theatre technician at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford, so he simply asked the surgeon in charge for some advice.

A biopsy was performed, and the next day, Barry, 54 who rose to fame in the late 1960s and 1970s as a daredevil member of the Swindon Robins motorcycle team got the phone call he had been dreading. The growth was cancerous.

In fact, it was a secondary tumour, meaning surgeons had to search for the primary growth.

The father-of-three from Penhill said: "They couldn't find it at first, so they took out my left tonsil, and found that I had tonsil bed cancer.

"The good news was that the cancer was together."

A complicated 10-hour operation followed to remove the tumour, which had grown to the size of a golf ball. Surgeons at the Radcliffe had to split Barry's jaw in two so they could reach the cancer.

Once the cancer had been removed, doctors had to carry out complex reconstructive surgery.

A metal plate was inserted into his jaw, and skin from his arm was used to replace tissue that had been removed from the tonsil bed.

After two weeks in hospital, Barry underwent radiotherapy for six weeks at the Churchill Hospital, also in Oxford, to ensure any remaining cancer cells were killed off.

Given the seriousness of the operation, Barry has been left with few side effects. "The side of my face can go numb during cold weather, and because I had a saliva gland taken out, I get very thirsty," he said.

Since the operation, in 1999, Barry has had regular check-ups, which will continue for another year. It was the early diagnosis that probably saved his life.

"If I hadn't had it checked out so quickly, I wouldn't be here now," he said. "It would have carried on spreading through my neck, and probably would have stopped the blood flow to my brain."

Barry now helps other patients who are about to undergo similar operations to the one he had.

"People are often horrified at what they are about to go through, but I tell them that there is life afterwards," he said.

And patients could not wish for a more inspiring person to reassure them. To see Barry in action on his bike, you would never know he had been ill. He still makes pulses race with his stunts in the Swindon-based Over the Top Motorcycle Stunt Team. His party piece is riding through a flaming hoop.

Barry's brush with cancer made him take stock of his life. He altered his work hours, so he could spend more time with girlfriend, Karen, 36, and their 18-month-old daughter, Alice.

Barry is giving his full support to the Evening Advertiser's Macmillan appeal. He said: "The nurses really are fantastic people, and the more nurses we get the better."

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