Sudanese music star Hawa Mohammed Adam hopes the lifting of US trade sanctions means she will no longer have to travel to Egypt to receive life-saving treatment for cancer.

She was diagnosed with breast cancer last year and her extended family, friends and fans raised the money to send her to Cairo.

Her cancer initially spread because old scanning machines in Sudan had failed to detect the seriousness of her condition.

"I discovered that I did not only have one tumour, but several tumours," says the musician, who also teaches piano at the University of Sudan and is looking forward to returning to work.

"Despite the fact that that we have very competent doctors, we do not have devices, equipment and tools. We do not have anything."

The US government announced on 12 October that most economic sanctions were being lifted.

They were originally imposed on Sudan in the 1990s for harbouring fugitives such as al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, and included the freezing of all Sudanese government assets in the US and a ban on Washington's allies trading with Khartoum.