A woman who has never smoked says she was shocked to be told she had terminal lung cancer despite being “fit and healthy”.

Sara Turle, from Westgate-on-Sea near Margate, was suffering from a cough over Christmas in 2022.

It persisted, and the next April she was given the devastating news that she had between 18 months and a few years to live.

The 64-year-old said: “To look at me, no one would ever know I was living with the diagnosis I have.

“They initially told me it could be 18 months to a few years, but I’m at the 18-month mark now from starting treatment and I’m feeling good.

“I had been walking miles, I was fit and healthy, and I’d never smoked so it wasn’t something I saw coming - but all you need is lungs to get lung cancer.”

It is not the first time the grandmother has battled the disease, having beaten unrelated breast cancer in 2010.

It touched her family once more in 2020 when her husband John was diagnosed with mouth cancer.

Sara recalled: “Cancer has played a significant part in our lives and John and I together have dealt with an awful lot.

“Things that impact on our family are the hardest.

“It was devastating to hear it was incurable but it is fantastic that it is treatable, and that the molecular make-up means I can have the targeted treatment.”

Sara has been taking Osimertinib, which she describes as a “wonder drug”.

It blocks the proteins on cancer cells that encourage them to grow.

“My children asked if we would have Christmas, and I had to say I had no idea,” Sara continued.

“But I made it, then my grandson’s second birthday, but I had a wave of wondering whether I would be here for his third.

“I was – but I can’t say if I will be here for his fourth.

“We are learning to live with it and dark humour helps get us through.

“If we are laughing, everyone else can laugh too.”

Since her diagnosis, Sara - who previously worked in pastoral care at a nursery - has been “getting on with the life she has always lived”.

She said: “I am certainly not living every moment as if it is my last, or thinking I have to make the most of every single day.

“I’m just getting on with living the life I have always lived as best I can, recognising there are times I feel sad and taking joy from every opportunity I can.

“That could be a sunrise or sunset, the sea, or seeing a dandelion or a daisy.

“And a Gregg’s hot sausage roll never fails to make me smile!

“I walk miles and miles a day, enjoying the things I have always enjoyed; being a granny and following Formula 1.”

She also volunteers as a patient partner with the NHS as part of the NHS England Cancer Patient and Public Voice Forum and the Kent and Medway Cancer Alliance.

It helps shape NHS cancer treatment by bringing important views and perspectives from patients to health chiefs.

Sara says the role “continues to bring real purpose to my days”.

She said: “But, it is discombobulating. I don’t look any different but I’m living with the knowledge that at some point the wonder drug might not be able to keep holding it back and we will have to look at other treatments, and then that clock will be ticking a bit more.”

Sara has scans every three months to check the cancer has not spread, and monthly check-ups with her medical team.

She added: “I have received nothing but compassionate care from everyone at East Kent Hospitals.

“The team at the Viking Day Unit help get me through it – everyone there has a part to play.

“I feel this warm hug of support when I go in there; they are all amazing.

“My oncologist, Dr Jane Brown, is superb and perfect for me, and my lung cancer clinical nurse specialist Sharon Gill is incredible.

“People say I inspire them, but all I am doing is muddling through, supported by my most fantastic family, friends, and healthcare team.”