FRUSTRATED Heather Webb says she will have to face years of hell after funding to treat her food intolerance was turned down for a second time.

Livid Mrs Webb spent hours preparing a presentation to appeal against a decision not to fund the treatment she believes would provide "light at the end of the tunnel".

The former nurse has been battling with health officials at the Chilterns and South Bucks Primary Care Group to try a treatment that she thinks could improve her standard of living.

She began to suffer from the food intolerance in 1999 and can no longer eat a whole host of normal foods like fish, chicken, apples and oranges.

But after spending hours preparing a presentation on the treatment to appeal to the care group recently, she has been refused funding a second time.

Mrs Webb, of Loudhams Road, in Little Chalfont, regularly suffers from cold sweats, abdominal cramps and even depression because of the condition and is furious that she cannot try the treatment to try to ease her suffering.

She says she is desperate to try the treatment, called enzyme potential de-sensitisation as it could help strengthen her immune system against allergies, similar to the way a vaccine works.

She added: "Life is hell at the moment and there is hardly anything I can actually eat. I have to eat the same food on a three-day rotation. Even drinking tea is a nightmare."

But Dr Angela Bishop, chairman of the primary care group, said that they consulted with the Public Health Department and could find no published evidence that the treatment, a course of injections, could work on Mrs Webb's condition.

She added: "In this case we could not find any evidence to back up the treatment for the condition from any professionals."