A NINE-year-old girl from Ramsbottom was a special guest at an event to mark the start of work on a high-tech cancer treatment centre.

Lucy Thomas had been invited by The Christie NHS Foundation Trust to be part of the ground-breaking ceremony for the UK’s first NHS high energy proton beam therapy centre.

Proton beam therapy is a specialist form of radiotherapy that targets certain cancers, increasing success rates and reducing side-effects.

Lucy, who was just six years old when she was diagnosed with cancer, was joined by fellow Christie patient Andrea Seal, aged 40, from Middleton: they have both received proton beam therapy overseas in the USA.

The duo officially ‘broke the ground’ at the site of the £125M centre, in Wilmslow Road, Manchester, which is expected to open in 2018.

Because of the type of cancer Lucy had, a rare and aggressive form of muscle cancer called rhabdomyosarcoma, the best option was to have proton beam therapy, an advanced form of radiotherapy unavailable in the UK.

As part of the NHS Proton Overseas Programme, Lucy, her parents Stuart and Caroline, and her brother Owen, travelled to Oklahoma in the USA for 11 weeks of treatment.

Stuart, of Stanford Hall Crescent, said: “Although we received excellent care and treatment abroad, it would have been easier if it had been available in the UK.

“We felt cut off from our extended family and close friends just when we needed them the most.

“Owen missed around eight weeks of school whilst we were out there, so having to go to America for the proton beam therapy really hit us all.

“The main benefit of having proton beam therapy in the UK is that it will be much more accessible. In our case, Lucy’s extended family would have been able to help support her though the treatment."

Caroline added: “It’s absolutely fantastic to know that proton beam therapy is finally coming to the UK, and particularly Manchester.

“It will give more children like Lucy the opportunity to have this form of treatment.”

Currently the NHS has to send children and adults needing proton beam therapy abroad to the United States and Switzerland, but from 2018, two centres at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust in Manchester and University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust will offer the treatment.

Roger Spencer, chief executive of The Christie, said: “To be able to offer the world’s most advanced form of radiotherapy through the NHS in the UK is a real step change for patients ensuring they benefit from local access to this advanced form of treatment, with potentially better outcomes and less chance of long term side effects.”

The Christie centre will treat up to 750 patients per year at full capacity although while both centres are being built, all clinically appropriate NHS patients will continue to be funded to go overseas for treatment.