Image source, Steven Marsland Image caption,

Steven Marsland, pictured with his family, said he felt anxious about potentially losing the drug keeping him alive

By Charlie Jones

BBC News, Suffolk

Cancer patients said they felt relieved they could continue taking life-saving drugs after a policy change.

Doctors were not allowed to automatically prescribe two bowel cancer drugs on the NHS in England if patients had taken a break from them.

Steven Marsland, 38, from Brantham, Suffolk, said the decision meant he now had "one less thing to worry about".

The policy affected the drugs cetuximab and panitumumab.

Image source, Steven Marsland Image caption,

Mr Marsland has been through 93 rounds of chemotherapy and 28 lots of radiotherapy since he was diagnosed in 2018

Before the rule change, if a patient took a treatment break for longer than six weeks they would have to reapply for NHS funding, with no guarantee it would be approved.