A TEENAGER who is fighting cancer for the third time has been told her only option left is a bone marrow transplant.

Maisie Bulmer, from Salton, is appealing for people to join the Anthony Nolan donor register after finding out that none of her three siblings are tissue-type matches.

The 18-year-old, who completed the York Race for Life on Sunday in aid of Cancer Research UK, said she had found a small lump on her neck in March.

Maisie said: "I was told the cancer had come back for the third time and although I am having chemotherapy at the moment to get back into remission, having a bone marrow transplant is the last thing I can do.

"After finding out that neither my sister Rosie, or brothers George and Henry are tissue-type matches, as a family we are gutted. This now means they have to find a unrelated match from the donor register."

Maisie was first diagnosed with cancer in May 2014, aged 16, when she found a walnut-sized lump in her neck, and after a biopsy at York Hospital was told she was suffering from B-Cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

She finished chemotherapy that October, but was told on Christmas Eve 2014 that the cancer had returned and faced more high dose chemotherapy and radiotherapy, including a six-week stay in isolation at Leeds General Infirmary.

At the beginning of April this year she was told she had again relapsed and the cancer had come back.

Despite her illness, Maisie and her family have raised more than £30,000 for cancer charities and has completed a B-Tech at Bishop Burton College a year early.

Maisie said she now had a place to start a degree in September and would like to be a PE teacher.

"At the moment I feel ok but I tend to go downhill when I have had chemo, but it is nothing to what I've been through before," she said.

"I would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has registered to the Anthony Nolan register and would encourage everyone to do the same. It doesn't cost anything and it could help save a life.

"I am hoping to start treatment in September and they are looking for a donor in the UK and if they don't find one they will go aboard. At the moment I am being optimistic and hoping for the best."

Maisie’s sister Rosie, 23, said: “There was a 30 per cent chance of one of us being a match for Maisie and we were devastated that none of us were a tissue-type match. We are all hoping to raise awareness among people aged 17 to 30 who are able to sign up to the Anthony Nolan register to do so and give Maisie and others a greater chance of being cured of this dreadful disease.”

For more information, go to anthonynolan.org