Doctor was diagnosed with cancer after his pals noticed how he sat on his bike

A retired doctor was diagnosed with cancer after his friend noticed something not quite right with him during a bike ride.

A pal of Anthony Ayles, 68, noticed he was sitting "wonky" on his saddle, and later pointed it out. Despite a back ache due to an old ski injury, he sought medical advice after being told he was leaning more to one side rather than sitting upright during their gruelling trip ride in Switzerland.

Grandad Anthony, from Edinburgh, Scotland, went to see his GP and a fist-sized tumour was found on the side of his back and he was diagnosed with lymphoma - a cancer which originates from the lymph nodes, a part of the immune system. The father-of-three was glad he checked - and didn't just put the issue down to the strains of his cycling challenge. It comes after the NHS warns mouth symptom could be life-shortening disease.

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"I was pretty fit at the time and feeling quite fit. I was cycling 100 miles a day at this point, as part of a group travelling 700 miles from Dunkirk to Murren, Switzerland," he told EdinburghLive. "He was behind me and he said, oh, Anthony, by the way, you're sitting squint on the seat. And I tried to sort of reshape myself. And he said, 'no, you're still squint'.

"And I didn't think much about it, but funny enough, my back had been hurting." Anthony has previously broken his back in a ski accident in the 1970s so "back ache is not terribly new" to him. But he realised the pain he was feeling now was in a different spot to where his previous injury had hurt.

So after the bike ride, in May 2024, he visited his doctor. He said: "I started thinking, you know, this isn't right. A lot of my friends were in pain from the long cycles, but my pain didn't settle on my return to Edinburgh." He had CT scans, MRIs and X-rays in June 2024 at the Western General Hospital, Edinburgh, which showed a tumour "the size of a fist" buried in the right side of his back.

There were also tumours in his ribs and his spine. Anthony continued: "It's not something you see yourself because you just stand in the mirror and you don't look at your back, do you? I had to go to a clinic for cancers of undiagnosed origins - I ultimately had a biopsy which gave the tissue diagnosis."

"They had excluded various other cancers through the tests - they even said it was unlikely to be lymphoma as they couldn't see the blood markers. At that point I was left with a likely diagnosis of pancreatic cancer - which is known to have a poorer prognosis. So when I knew it was lymphoma, I was relieved in a way.

"Even though I've actually got a rather difficult type of lymphoma to treat. It's not one of the ones that you expect to cure, but because I was strong in many other ways, they said I could withstand quite nasty treatments." Anthony believes his career helped him cope.

He said: "My doctor asked 'do you want to be spoken to as a doctor or as a patient?' And I said, 'no, treat me as a doctor, I can't pretend to have forgotten all the medicine I knew'." Anthony's treatments, including chemotherapy and radiotherapy, lasted from August 2024 through until January. He was in remission in May, and he is awaiting results of further tests which may require further treatment if they show a recurrence.

Anthony plans to cycle 56 miles around Glasgow, the Trossachs and back again in the hope to raise £5000 for the charity Lymphoma Action, in September. He added: "Having medical knowledge, I believe, helped me. You can afford to feel more positive. And the cycle ride is a target I will use to build my strength up, so if I do require more treatment, I will be as fit as possible."

To donate to Anthony's fundraiser, you can do so here.