They thought it was an infection, but it turned out to be sinus cancer, which occurs once in a million! Doctors had to amputate his eye

Compiled by: Selin Irmak Kaçmaz Photos: TikTok

The young woman woke up one morning and felt pain in her eye. She did not know that this pain could be a sign of a disease that occurs one in a million. But unfortunately that was the case and doctors had to cut off the young woman’s eye to prevent the disease from progressing.

A young woman named Annika woke up one morning last year to find that the inner corner of her right eye hurt. At first he did not pay much attention to this pain, but by evening the right side of his face began to hurt seriously.

When he woke up the next day, the area around his right eye was swollen. When Annika saw the swelling, she decided that she had to go to the doctor. A CT scan taken in the emergency room showed that Annika had inflammation around her eye, and doctors suspected she had a sinus infection. The swelling subsided within a few days, but returned about a week later.

FOURTH STAGE CINONAZAL CARCINOMA SMARCB1 WAS DIAGNOSED

On Annika’s second visit to the emergency room, the doctor said, “This does not look like a sinus infection,” and referred the young woman to computed tomography (CT) again. This time, the CT scan detected a mass approximately the size of a golf ball. According to doctors, this mass did not exist three weeks ago.

After a CT scan, Annika was diagnosed with stage four sinonasal carcinoma SMARCB1, which had spread to her face, lungs and lymph nodes, when she was just 27 years old.

Annika said she started chemotherapy almost immediately, which lasted nine weeks. However, chemotherapy provided little improvement in the young woman, and she underwent surgery in December 2023. During the surgery, they had to remove surrounding tissue, including Annika’s right eye.

‘WHAT YOU SEE IN MY EYES IS ACTUALLY A PART OF MY THIGH’

“So what you see in my eye right now is actually a piece of my thigh filling that gap. “I was told it would go down one way or another, but it’s also a different color because my thigh was much more tanned,” the young woman said.

“An experimental treatment plan that includes chemotherapy and immunotherapy is currently being implemented to slow the spread of the disease. Even though the statistics are grim, I don’t know what lies ahead. But I know this; What awaits me is not something very good. When I read about my cancer, I know it is rare, aggressive, and will get worse down the road. Still, no doctor told me ‘you only have this long to live’.”