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Solider who had brain surgery while awake given heartbreaking prognosis in BBC doc

Surgeons: At the Edge of Life was an emotional watch

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BBC Two documentary Surgeons: At the Edge of Life had viewers praising our amazing NHS and the bravery of one young soldier who underwent brain surgery while still awake.

Cameron, 20, had his whole career ahead of him as a newly qualified Army medic.

But his life was thrown into turmoil when doctors told him he had a brain tumour and they needed to operate.

Cameron had just qualified as a medic in the army (Credit: BBC)

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The Lancashire lad’s only hope for survival was to undergo a ground-breaking procedure at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham.

His surgeon, top consultant Ismail, said: “Failure is absolutely possible and that’s what drives me – that I don’t fail my patients and do everything I can to reduce the risk.”

Cameron explained: “I knew I wanted Ismail to be my surgeon, I didn’t want anyone else.”

He wanted Ismail to do the surgery (Credit: BBC)

Speech therapist Becky Marr was with Cameron in the operating theatre, where her job was to assess the effects of the operation on the young solider’s ability to speak.

Cameron was asleep for the first part of the surgery, before the team brought him around to check the op wasn’t causing any permanent issues.

Cameron was woken up while still on the operating table (Credit: BBC)

Discussing the potentially devastating effects of this kind of surgery, Ismail told viewers: “It can be catastrophic to remove too much of the tumour. It can turn someone who is completely independent into someone who is completely dependent.”

The surgery was initially successful, but Cameron was anxious when he woke up and didn’t know where he was at first.

The situation worsened when he found himself unable to speak.

Ismail managed to removed most of the tumour (Credit: BBC)

In the end, Ismail was able to cut out 80% of the tumour in Cameron’s brain.

Although the op didn’t affect his speech, the prognosis wasn’t good.

It was revealed that Cameron had stage-three cancer, which would require chemotherapy and radiotherapy and cut his likelihood of survival from decades to years.

Cameron’s prognosis wasn’t good (Credit: BBC)

Viewers took to Twitter as the scenes unfolded.

One wrote: “Cameron is so brave to show the emotional vulnerability he is facing during [his] #AwakeCraniotomy on national TV, for [the message] it will send. He is as much a hero as Ish & Becky.”

Another said: “Poor Cameron. Awful diagnosis. #SurgeonsAtTheEdgeOfLife.”

Someone else tweeted: “Not sure watching #SurgeonsAtTheEdgeOfLife is the best thing to watch when I’m having an operation very close to my brain soon, but absolutely fascinating, Cameron is so brave.”

A fourth commented: “Absolutely incredible #SurgeonsAtTheEdgeOfLife. Amazing #NHS. Hang in there Cameron.”

“What an amazing documentary,” said another, adding: “Incredible talent by all the surgeons and their support teams. God love the #NHS.”

https://twitter.com/clockwork_dolly/status/1115719995177172993

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A devastated Ismail said giving him the bad news was the “ultimate challenge” and explained it “really hits home” in someone as young as Cameron.

– Surgeons: At the Edge of Life is back on BBC Two tonight (April 10th) at 9pm

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Nancy Brown
Associate Editor