The patient thought he had only 6 months left, and subsequently lived it up:

When doctors diagnosed cancer and told John Brandrick that he had less than a year to live, he resolved to make the most of the time he had left.

The 62-year-old council worker quit his job, sold his car, stopped paying his mortgage and dug into his life savings so he could treat himself and relatives to expensive restaurant meals.

He even sold all his clothes but for the black suit in which he expected to be buried.

A year later, however, with no sign of the Grim Reaper coming to call, he went for tests – which gave him a clean bill of health. He had never had cancer at all.