TV presenter Fiona Phillips has shared she has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease. The 62-year-old Mirror columnist was told she had the illness a year ago after suffering months of brain fog and anxiety.
Fiona is currently undergoing trials for a new drug - scientists hope could slow or even reverse the illness for millions of sufferers in the years to come. The former breakfast TV host told the Mirror, said: "This disease has ravaged my family and now it has come for me.
"And all over the country there are people of all different ages whose lives are being affected by it - it’s heartbreaking. I just hope I can help find a cure which might make things better for others in the future."
It was a shuddering shock when a doctor told her one afternoon last year: “Your results are back... And yes, I’m afraid they do show early stages of Alzheimer's Disease."
“It’s something I might have thought I’d get at 80”, she says. “But I was still only 61 years old. I felt more angry than anything else because this disease has already impacted my life in so many ways; my poor mum was crippled with it, then my dad, my grandparents, my uncle. It just keeps coming back for us.”
Fiona’s husband, TV’s This Morning editor Martin Frizell, 64, said: “Yes, tragically Fiona’s family has been riddled with it.”
After 18 months, Fiona chose to share the news with readers of the Mirror where she has been a columnist for almost 20 years. “No one has known because I haven’t been blaring out loud, ‘oh yeh, I’ve got Alzheimer's. And I have been so worried people will judge me or put labels on me.
“It’s a horrible bloody secret to divulge.” Fiona, who is mum to Nat, 24, and Mackenzie, 21, hopes by telling her story she can help end the stigma which remains around the disease - and give comfort to others by sharing news of clinical trials in which she is taking part which could revolutionise future Alzheimer’s treatment.
“There is still an issue with this disease that the public thinks of old people, bending over a stick, talking to themselves,’ says Fiona. “But I’m still here, getting out and about, meeting friends for coffee, going for dinner with Martin and walking every day.”
“It all started with Fiona feeling crippling anxiety towards the end of 2021," explains Martin. “And I’d never had that in my life," Fiona adds.
Martin said: “We thought maybe it was the menopause because all the symptoms were there; brain fog, anxiety and confusion. We got in touch with a menopause specialist who took her under their wing and put her on HRT but while that improved some symptoms, the brain fog remained.”
The menopause specialists suggested Fiona seek further help to explain why she was struggling to remember things and after months of cognitive tests and then a lumbar puncture to assess spinal fluid came the diagnosis she had dreaded. The nature of the illness means there are parts of the story Fiona is no longer able to remember.
Martin patiently and gently reminds her. Sometimes she’s cross at his recollections which don’t tally with her own understanding. Mostly though she laughs, willingly clinging to the memories he throws out.
One moment seared on both their minds though is when the doctor revealed Fiona’s diagnosis. “I just felt sick," says Martin. ‘
“We both sat in silence. There was no funny line to make this go away. Nothing smart to say. Nothing. And then the doctor said he’d leave us in the room alone for a bit to digest it all. We just looked at each other and said: ‘Shit. What are we going to do?”
Fiona adds: “It was the shock... Total shock. And then we said to each other.. ‘Shall we go and have a drink? So that’s what we did. In fact, we’ve now become locals at the pub on the square by the hospital!”
Fiona and Martin were then faced with the enormous challenge of What Next? “The doctor had said it was very early stages so we just had to go home and try to live our life as normal for now," says Martin. "That was all we could do.”
Amid the shock, there has been some hope to cling to. Clinical trials for drugs which could slow the progress of the disease were ongoing at University College Hospital (UCH) in London - and the research team was looking to recruit trialists.
Fiona was also put on some of the existing drugs which have been prescribed in the UK for the disease for almost 20 years. While they may mask symptoms for some patients, they do not slow or reverse the disease’s progress.
The drugs, Miridesap, being trialled at UCH are very different though. If successful, approved by the clinical authorities, and accepted for funding - three fairly big ifs - these drugs could be life-changing for millions by slowing or even reversing the illness.
To qualify for the trial Fiona had to undergo tests to prove her Alzheimer’s was still at the mild stages. She was quizzed on such things as; which month is it, which season, subtract 7 from 100, then from 93, and 86 and so on and so on.
"The tests were stressful," says Fiona. “The last time I did something like that was when I was at school or at a job interview and there I was suddenly thinking: ‘Oh God what if I can’t answer these questions?”
Fortunately, Fiona’s Alzheimer’s was confirmed as mild and she was accepted for the very last place on the trial. Her drugs - administered three times a day with tiny needles - are one of several currently being researched at UCLH.
The drug is in its third year of assessment - scientists are confident it can deliver results but are still researching any side effects or safety issues. With around half the triallists on a placebo drug, it could be that Fiona isn’t even benefitting from the new drugs herself.
“Even the people we see for the check-ups don’t know if Fiona is on the real drug or a placebo," says Martin. “But even if it isn’t helping me, these tests will be helping other people in the future so I just have to keep going," adds Fiona.
Worldwide more than 130 tests are currently taking place.
