Laura and Fiona climb back to fitness and raise awareness of cancer

The 26-year-old can still remember the horror of being rung up at her Leamington office after going to have a routine check on the moles on her abdomen.

“Somebody said ‘the doctor’s on the phone’ and my heart sank,” said Laura.

That was last summer when a personal assistant in the dermatology department at Warwick Hospital gently told Laura the doctor needed to see her as a matter of urgency.

After malignant melanoma was diagnosed on her abdomen, Laura received an urgent operation followed by months of difficult treatment.

She is now in remission and just before Christmas managed to return to her job as an adviser in a digital photography call centre.

But both Laura and her doctor believe the cancer was triggered by the four or five times a week sunbed sessions that she’d enjoyed years earlier.

Despite her scars, Laura is determined not to let the illness grind her down. And one particularly encouraging piece of news was after fellow worker Fiona Clipson told her she was in remission after being diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma eight years earlier.

Fiona, 27, who lives in Stockton, near Southam, knows her condition was not sunbed-related,

Now, after sharing their health concerns, both young women decided to put sickness on the back burner.

Instead of cancer being uppermost in their minds, this year they’re planning to tackle the Three Peak Challenge: Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowden.

Fiona said: “I had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma quite badly but have been in remission since December, 2002, At the moment Laura and I are trying to raise at least £399 each so that we can challenge our bodies and raise money for the British Skin Foundation’s Skin Cancer Appeal.”

The pair are keen to get sponsorship as well as sending out a strong message about the dangers of sunbeds.

Laura’s niece, Taylor, has already made a start by raising £180 at a bake sale in her school, St Anthony’s Primary School in Sydenham.

For more information email [email protected] or call 07590 697893.