A Spanish woman has thanked a stranger who saved her life after approaching her on a bus to tell her she was suffering from a rare disease.

Montse Ventura, 55, said a woman who sat opposite her on Barcelona’s number 64 bus nine months ago urged her to have tests for acromegaly, a disorder resulting from an excess of growth hormone due to a pituitary gland tumour.

She said she had never heard of the disorder but the woman handed her a piece of paper where she had written down the names of two clinical tests, the Guardian newspaper reported.

“She wrote something down and said ‘Have the analysis done as soon as possible because if you wait until you feel the need to consult your doctor, you may already be in a very bad state,’” Ventura said.

“A month later I went to my gynaecologist for my annual check-up. I handed over the piece of paper and asked for those tests to be added to the standard ones.”

She said that to her doctor’s surprise, the test results rang alarm bells. “Some hormonal measures were totally abnormal,” she said. “I had more tests done and they ended up operating on a tumour.” The operation to remove the tiny tumour from the pea-sized pituitary gland at the base of her brain was successful.

After the story was reported in newspapers across Spain a 60-year-old endocrinologist rang La Vanguardia newspaper on Tuesday to say she had been the “guardian angel”.

She told the newspaper she had made the diagnosis after seeing Ventura’s unusually shaped hands. “The hands gave me a lot of clues but I wasn’t sure whether to say anything but I am a very spontaneous person,” she explained.

“I’d rather put my foot in it than keep the worry to myself.”

Ventura said that she and her guardian angel had now spoken by phone and the two will meet when the media fuss in Spain dies down.

[via: telegraph.co.uk]

Other articles you may be interested in: