A choral singer who suffered oral cancer is preparing to rejoin a women's choir after having her tongue rebuilt with tissue from her arm.
Marlene Gaunt thought hat she would never talk properly or sing in tune again when she was told that she had a growth in her mouth, but surgeons at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, removed a third of her tongue and rebuilt it with tissue, blood vessels and an artery section from her left forearm.
Eleven weeks after the operation she is talking normally and is practising scales daily as she prepares to join her 25 colleagues in the Phoenix Singers at Swaffham, Norfolk.
Mrs Gaunt, a soprano, said: "Just having the ability to speak again is a miracle to me, but what makes it even more remarkable is that I am getting my singing voice back. I can already hit top A. I am confident of reaching even higher notes soon and want to be back with the choir by July."
Mrs Gaunt first noticed what she thought was an ulcer on her tongue last Christmas. Her dentist sent her to Queen Elizabeth Hospital at Kings Lynn, where cancer was diagnosed. She was then referred to Leo Cheng, the consultant surgeon who runs the Maxillofacial unit, which specialises in the jawbone and the face, at Addenbrooke's.
He and his team removed the section of tongue and carried out microsurgery to connect the veins, arteries and tissue in a 23-hour operation on January 19.
Mrs Gaunt, who had speech therapy while in hospital, said: "By the time I left I could talk fairly well, but I sounded a bit like Marlon Brando in The Godfather. Now my speech is improving by the day and I cannot wait to sing properly again."
She has arranged a concert by the Phoenix Singers and the Lynn Male Voice Choir on June 8 at the Roman Catholic Church in Swaffham to raise funds for Mr Cheng's clinic, as a way of saying thank you.
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