In Summer 2021, new Hervey Bay local Peter ‘Mac’ Marron was diagnosed with lung cancer.
Only 12 months earlier, Mac, an Irish-born computer engineer, and his wife had packed up their life of more than 32 years in Darwin to embark on their retirement years.
“I wasn’t really having any symptoms, aside from one night I got up in the night and coughed and there was some blood in the cough,” Mac said.
“I made an appointment to see my local doctor that week, he listened to my lungs and asked me to have a CT scan as soon as I could.
“I had the CT scan on Tuesday and the doctor called me in on Wednesday. He gave me a referral to a thoracic physician, Dr Christopher Zappala, and I had a phone conference with him on Thursday.
“On Sunday, we travelled to Brisbane to The Wesley Hospital. It all happened really quick,” he remembered.
At The Wesley, Mac underwent tests including a bronchoscopy to biopsy a tumour which had been found on his lung.
“I started immediately almost on chemotherapy and radiation therapy. We were very lucky, my wife has a brother in Brisbane who we were able to stay with while I received treatment,” Mac said.
Over the next eight weeks, Mac underwent gruelling treatment, including eight rounds of chemotherapy, 30 radiation treatments, blood transfusions and some short stays in hospital.
“On the second last chemotherapy treatment, I said to the nurse ‘next week will be my last,’ and she said ‘you get to ring the bell then’ and I said, ‘what do you mean?’,” Mac recalled.
“She explained there is a bell on the wall and you get to ring it on your way out. Because you are going out of here and it’s your last treatment, you get to ring the bell!”
When the last day arrived, Mac shouted morning tea for all the staff and proudly rang the bell.
“I rang the bell and there was this rapturous round of applause from everywhere,” Mac said.
“They didn’t tell me to expect that, but everyone seemed to drop what they were doing and they clapped, everyone, patients, doctors, nurses, admin, everybody. That was quite a moment.
“I get a bit teary now when I think about it. It was very special,” he said.
Soon after, Mac’s treating team in Brisbane referred him to Dr Dolly Mittal at St Stephen’s Hospital in Hervey Bay to receive the last stage of his treatment closer to home.
“I had 26 immunotherapy treatments at St Stephen’s, and I was thinking as I was coming to the end of those treatments, I wonder is there a bell here?” Mac said.
“I asked one of the nurses and she said, ‘no there’s not but that’s a great idea! I’m going to get one’.”
Moved so much by his chance to ring the bell, Mac wanted to pass on the same joy to other patients, and made a special donation to the Forbes Cancer Care Centre at St Stephen’s.
“Anyway, I beat her to it! I brought a bell in on my second last treatment, and sure enough they had it on the wall when I arrived a fortnight later for my last treatment,” he said.
“And I think I was the first one to give it a ring!”
Now, just over a year and half since being diagnosed, Mac is cancer free.
“I had a PET scan and that scan said that no cancer was detected…My tumour was 11cm. It’s now gone,” Mac said.
“I feel very well, I probably feel better than before I was diagnosed because I’m living a healthier life. I walk seven kilometres every morning, cycle 15 kilometres every afternoon, potter around in the garden and I feel really healthy.
“Now all I need is regular scans. I saw Dr Dolly after the PET scan and then Dr Chris, and we did a toss to see which doctor would continue to look after me for scans. Dr Dolly won that toss!
“I’m very happy with the way things have gone along, I feel that I’m lucky everything seemed to work out good for me,” he said.
Mac is looking forward to continuing to enjoy his retirement and to spending Christmas this year with his wife and daughter in the Hunter region of New South Wales.
He hopes the bell at St Stephen’s Forbes Cancer Care Centre will ring loudly often, every time a moment is conquered.