A 30-year-old circus performer shows us how a common symptom can lead to a major diagnosis.
Paramedic and circus performer Paige Footne is no stranger to dangerous environments and circumstances. But there was a different level of fear she experienced in June, following a common symptom she had that led to a terrifying diagnosis.
Just when she was planning to head off to the Edinburgh Festival on June 27, she found out that she had a benign brain tumour and she found out in the most unpredictable of ways. The 30-year-old is now facing the aftereffects of having brain surgery.
The doctors discovered a four-centimetre tumour developing in her brain. Speaking to FEMAIL, Paige said about her trip: “'I'd paid for everything on my credit card already.
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"I have $13,000 to pay off from it - and I hadn't brought my travel insurance yet."
Paige had been planning to perform at the festival during he trip and had been training hard for the event, too.
Speaking on being a circus performer, the Australian said: “The circus is more than a full-time job.
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"And because I'm 30, I'm considered old in circus, so I'm really trying to make it, and I just give it all I have.”
However, despite her dedication to the circus, Paige took time to stop and listen to her body. She noticed that something didn’t feel right. The performer has been living with tinnitus - a condition which causes her to have a constant sound in her ear, for four years.
"I had unilateral pulsatile tinnitus in one ear. It wasn't ringing, it was more of a whooshing and pulsing in my ear," Paige explained.
"I mentioned it to my GP, because it can be a sinister sign of something, and then they referred me to an ENT. Eventually, it showed I had some damage to the nerves on the left side."
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Initially, doctors suspected it was linked to a minor head injury during training, but just in case, Paige booked an MRI scan on June 6.
It was this scan that showed that she had a brain tumour located in her posterior right frontal lobe.
The shocker is that it had nothing to do with her ear symptoms.
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“It was a completely incidental finding," she said. "The tumour was in the wrong spot to cause the tinnitus.
"Both neurosurgeons said I was so lucky, because the tumour isn't causing me any symptoms. So in a way, circus saved my life," says Paige.
Paige has now had surgery and is recovering from it in a hospital bed.
Maxine Harrison