A petition has been launched in memory of ‘dedicated’ graduate who died after a two-year illness.

Nikita Mepani, who lived in Lady Aylesford Avenue, Stanmore, and was a former pupil of Bentley Wood Girls School, died from leukaemia just ten days away from her 20th birthday following two years of trips to the doctors with no diagnosis.

At only three-years-old, Nikita was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis, and spent a great deal of her childhood in hospital visits for blood transfusions and check-ups.

Yet despite the disease – which put her into a high risk category for developing cancer – she remained up-beat and studied hard throughout her school years, committed to getting herself into university.

Then in 2010, while she was 17-years-old and studying pharmacology at the University of Portsmouth, she was admitted to hospital on several occasions with a series of infections.

Sonia Panchani, her cousin who studied with her, said: “We shopped together, studied together, cooked together at university, but she never showed that she was ill or struggling.

“I would go to every hospital visit with her that I could, and she would sit there having a blood transfusion and help me with my assignments, or if she wanted anything the first thing she’d ask me to bring her were her texts books. She was so dedicated to her studies.”

Despite doctors’ visits every two months on average and various treatments and bone marrow tests, no diagnosis was made until June 2012 – two years after she initially began complaining of becoming ill.

After undergoing extensive chemotherapy treatments, Nikita died of leukaemia on June 20, 2012, aged just 19.

Now her father Naresh Mepani, who still lives in their Stanmore home, has launched a petition to try to engage the Secretary of State for Health in a debate about misdiagnoses in the UK.

He said: “Losing your daughter is a devastating experience and it takes a little while for you to digest and work out what’s what and what to do next.

“I have waited about two years for me to sort out my research and get my mind right, and I thought that doing a petition would be the right thing to do and something she would definitely approve of because that was all Nikita ever wanted to do - help people.

“She was so passionate about helping people get the right treatment, especially for Ulcerative Colitis, and she worked so hard at university before she graduated – she once even went to a lecturer after having just had a blood transfusion.

“She was a lovely girl who just wanted to help people.”

The family hope to garner the support of thousands of people from across the country to highlight the issue and raise the debate about what can be done to prevent misdiagnoses.

Mr Mepani added: “We just want to get more people signing and get a discussion open, so that people are aware of the problem and can look at what can be done to prevent this ever happening to a family in the future.”