A woman who spent years battling against a mystery illness has found new hope in a Spanish doctor.

Mickia Brangman said she was “hopeful” that her upcoming meeting with a specialist in rare diseases would help her to identify and tackle a health problem she has struggled with for years.

The 35-year-old said, from her apartment in Spain: “It makes me feel at least a bit better to know that they’re targeting a specific area in my body.”

She added: “I really do try to stay strong and be positive about the outcome, but I feel like this might be the last chance that I have.”

Ms Brangman, who appealed for help in 2022 to raise funds for a medical trip to Britain, has been dealing with digestive issues and slow liver poisoning for more than a decade.

The former model first started experiencing problems when she was 20 after she got violently sick on a trip to Spain.

She initially thought she had contracted a stomach bug, but noticed that she suffered the same illness once or twice a year with worsening side-effects.

Ms Brangman explained: “I had never been previously sick before I left Bermuda and it wasn’t until I actually moved to Barcelona when I was 20 that I starting experiencing this stuff.”

She returned to Bermuda in 2016 to undergo a CAT scan at the suggestion of her general practitioner.

However, it was not until she went to see a nutritionist in 2021 that it was suggested she might have problems with her liver.

Ms Brangman moved to Birmingham, England, in February 2022 after she raised money through fundraisers.

She attended a holistic clinic and, to see if the source of her illness could be traced, was advised to return to Spain, which she did the following month.

There she saw a digestive specialist and underwent several tests.

The tests ruled out poisoning, parasites and ailments that specifically targeted her liver.

It was instead determined that Ms Brangman might have Wilkie’s syndrome, also known as superior mesenteric artery syndrome, a rare condition where the top portion of the small intestines is compressed between two major abdominal arteries.

The compression limits the amount of nutrients that can be absorbed by the body, and can lead to malnutrition, weight loss, nausea and abdominal pain and sensitivity.

Ms Brangman said that only about 500 cases of it had been reported worldwide, and added that “it sounds like something [surgeons] learn in school but they don’t really touch base on it because nobody actually gets it”.

She said that Wilkie’s syndrome could be treated with surgery, although it was not always successful.

Ms Brangman added that her physicians kept an open mind about what she could be facing.

She said that she was due for her first consultation last January, but her appointments were frequently cancelled without explanation.

The confusion eventually drove her to return to Bermuda, where she briefly sought assistance from Boris Vestweber, a surgeon on the island, before she returned to Spain last September for a better standard of living.

She explained that she found the cost of living in Bermuda to be “unsustainable”, and needed to maintain three jobs to stay afloat.

Ms Brangman added that, after more than a year of waiting, she will finally see a rare-disease specialist this month.

She thanked the Bermuda public for their support, particularly in helping her to relocate overseas after she met her GoFundMe goal of £6,500 – about $8,832 – in only six days.

Ms Brangman said: “That was really nice of people, being so concerned about my health at that time, especially because we didn’t know what was going on.”

She also pointed out that many people on the island reached out to her after her story was publicised to share the ailments they suffered.

Ms Brangman said: “The feedback that I got alone from e-mails and messages of other people secretly suffering was the worst part of all.

“I thought, ‘wait a minute, all of you guys are going through something and nobody’s speaking up about it?’ ”

She encouraged people who suspected they had health problems to contact a doctor as soon as possible.

She also recommended getting private healthcare if possible.