Felicity Jewis and Karen van Gorp were diagnosed with advanced melanoma but beat the odds with help from the 2024 Australians of the Year

A duo of melanoma-beating Adelaide mums and a leading medico are among those celebrating the 2024 Australians of the Year – for reasons close to their hearts.

Adelaide mum Felicity Jewis feared she wouldn’t see her baby girl grow up.

Now 41, the former top amateur triathlete was diagnosed with advanced melanoma just 10 days after the birth of her daughter Zara and wasn’t expected to survive.

In 2014 she had a nuisance mole cut from her back. It would rub on her sports bra and then bleed while in training for ironman triathlon events. It was found to be melanoma, but there was no evidence it had spread beyond the nearest lymph nodes.

However, the disease reared its head several years later as stage four cancer and was found to have travelled to her breast, liver and spine.

Former triathlete Felicity Jewis, 41 was treated by Prof Long. Picture: Kelly Barnes

“It was deemed terminal ... I was really shocked because I had been feeling well,” she said.

“I had a mixed response to early treatment, it worked in part, but not in full and I got very, very sick,” she said.

With hope fading, Mrs Jewis said her trusted Adelaide oncologist, Associate Professor Rachel Roberts-Thomson, facilitated a meeting with one of the newly-announced Australians of the Year, Professor Georgina Long, in Sydney to explore “the most advanced, ambitious options”.

Against all odds, the combination immunotherapy and targeted therapy agreed on by the medicos and administered in Adelaide, worked and Mrs Jewis has been cancer free since September 2019.

“Prof Long is so passionate and fierce about making the right decision for you ... she says the ambition is zero deaths from melanoma and she says it with such passion – it’s phenomenal,” Mrs Jewis said.

Adelaide’s Karen van Gorp gives thanks every day for the dedicated work done by melanoma researchers such as Prof Long and fellow Australian of the Year, Professor Richard Scolyer.

After having a mole removed in 2013, she received the bad news that the melanoma had spread — from lumps under her arms, to her lungs, bones,and rest of her body.

Mrs van Gorp, 60, of Blackwood, was accepted into a melanoma trial drug which proved to be a success.

Felicity Jewis with husband Mark Jewis. Picture: Kelly Barnes

“I had stage four melanoma, surgery and radiotherapy didn’t work,” she said. “I managed to get into a clinical trial and flew to Melbourne every second week for two years.

“I had just turned 50 and 2013 would have been my last Christmas, but it turned out I was a super responder to the drug.

“I now have to pinch myself — I am so grateful to be able to see my three children grow up.”

The immunotherapy drug Keytruda was approved due to the success of the trial and is now listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

Felicity Jewis, Zara Jewis, and Mark Jewis. Picture supplied

Felicity Jewis has overcome melanoma. Picture supplied

Prof Roberts-Thomson said the awarding of this year’s Australian of the Year jointly to the Melanoma Institute of Australia’s co-directors, Prof Long and Professor Richard Scolyer, was “heartwarming”.

“(They) are highly motivated clinicians ... it’s very special and really heartwarming as it brings into the public not only all the wonderful new developments that are going on to help treat patients with a cancer diagnosis but also the issue of melanoma prevention,” she said.

“We are all excited by the momentum that is happening to treat and prevent Australians dying from melanoma.”