Dr. Bethany Ballinger is a 47 year old woman, a trained British born doctor who is living and working in Orlando. She is working as a physician and as Director of Evidence-Based Medicine and Informatics for Florida Hospital’s Emergency Medicine Residency Program. In November 2015, Dr. Ballinger was diagnosed with colon cancer that had spread to the liver and lungs; stage IV (four).

Dr. Ballinger had no previous medical history or family history of colon cancer. Supposedly too young to be applicable for the standard screening, Bethany presented to the hospital with an abdominal pain which upon investigation was a perforated appendix.  It was only at this stage that it became clear that she indeed had colon cancer and was to have a battle ahead of her.

Bethany went from being totally fine one day, to a life changing diagnosis just a few days later.

As a doctor, Bethany’s natural reaction is to review her health herself and analyse where she might be able to get the treatment she needs to help her get better. In her role at Florida hospital, Bethany is often sifting through medical literature so this is not new to her. Yet, it soon became apparent that without specialist knowledge on this subject, she would need some help.

Dr. Ballinger contacted Alivia in June of 2016. Having already exhausted her own options, Bethany agreed to use Alivia’s Second Opinion Service to try to take her to the next step to help her identify one of the worlds leading doctors specific to her disease, metastatic colon cancer.

Alivia began to work on Bethany’s case right away and scoured the globe for highly specialised doctors of excellence who could opine on her case, and offer some assistance. The focus for Bethany as it is with many clients is to find an alternative, more effective treatment programme than the one she is already on. Failing that, at the very least get brilliant advice so Dr. Ballinger could know she is in the best hands possible.

Alivia’s Medical Intelligence Unit handpicked two doctors for second opinions and we are continuing to monitor her progress. Dr. Ballinger’s case is ongoing.

The key message to take from this case study is that Bethany is a Doctor. She has trained for years to learn the art of medicine yet she appreciates that with 52million medical articles published per year, you need to be highly specialised to be able to make a difference. Bethany chose Alivia, and we are doing all we can to help her with her fight.