Meet Marilyn

Marilyn, a successful, healthy working professional in Canberra’s health sector, was diagnosed with dermatomyositis, an inflammatory condition causing arthritis, muscle inflammation, and breathing problems. Unfortunately, her symptoms worsened quickly and she started to experience severe pain and swelling of her hands and wrists, back and neck pain and worsening knee pain. ​

The severity of her pain meant that Marilyn was forced to stop working and she continued to battle with daily living, struggling to use her hands to perform routine tasks writing, opening bottles, or lifting plates. ​

A significant challenge for Marilyn has been the symptoms from her medications.  Her condition placed significant financial pressure on her and her family with mounting medical and pharmacy costs combined with being unable to work.​

Since joining the personalised medicine program, Marilyn's condition has improved and her symptoms have reduced considerably. She is about to start a new treatment and we will continue to monitor her improvement. ​

" I see being part of Simon's research as a way of being able to progress medicine where in the future all conditions will be able to have some benefit. This will then improve patients standard of living and reduce their medical expenses and costs on medi-care and society as a whole. To me it is a wholistic way of health care into the future." - Marilyn.