Family's lives turned 'upside down' after toddler's stomach pains diagnosed as rare cancer

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A heartbroken family have said their lives have been turned "upside down" after their toddler's stomach pains were diagnosed as a rare form of cancer that had spread throughout her body.

Claire Formby and Mike Smith first noticed their daughter Ella was not herself during a day out at a museum on March 9. After the three-year-old was lethargic and complained of pains in her tummy the parents took her to their GP, but doctors said they couldn't find anything wrong.

The couple, from Runcorn, near Liverpool, then took their daughter to urgent care several times throughout the week and eventually the youngster was sent to the children's hospital for an ultrasound.

Doctors found a small mass above her left kidney before an MRI scan found Ella had a 7cm tumour in her stomach - and when an oncologist checked the scan again they found further masses in Ella's neck and thighs.The youngster had surgery and just 10 days after initially feeling unwell, it was confirmed Ella had stage four neuroblastoma - a cancer of specialised nerve cells called neural crest cells.Ella's auntie Joanne Formby told the Echo: "We all went to the museum for a day out and Ella was just really tired and really lethargic."Usually she is like a little Tasmanian devil but this day she just wanted to be carried, she wanted to get in the pram, which is so unlike her.