Gift to Conquest

That's how important the 50,000 joint gift to by the League of Friends of Bexhill Hospital and the Conquest friends is to patients from the district.

Theatre staff were bubbling with enthusiasm about the state-of-the-art equipment at Wednesday's ceremony, held to thank the two charities.

Harmonic scalpels work without heat. They make possible minimal invasive surgery that reduces blood loss.

Consultant surgeon Hugh Apthorp has told a major medical conference in Rome how a patient was able to return home a day after hip replacement surgery.

Consultant breast surgeon Elizabeth Shah told Bexhill League of Friends chairman Peter Mitchell Davis, secretary Sue Bryant and president John Dowling how use of a harmonic scalpel and its associated equipment reduces the trauma suffered by mastectomy sand breast-reconstruction patients.

Lead practitioner Cheryl Funnell speaks with almost missionary zeal about the transformation the new equipment has brought about at the Conquest.

Cheryl flew to Cincinnati to train in the use of equipment so state-of-the-art that the Conquest has scored a global "first" in its use.

She told the volunteers: "I can't tell you how grateful we are!"

Elizabeth Shah said: "It has helped to speed up surgery. We are doing a study at the moment to check on how much quicker patients can leave hospital after surgery. It reduces 'drainage,' it reduces blood-loss.

"It is just brilliant."

Lead practitioner Lorraine Neeson was equally enthusiastic. But she had to whisk one of the wheeled units away to theatre where it was needed.

The scalpels are in use for anything from gynaecological procedures to ear; nose and throat surgery.

Cheryl said: "We were the first hospital in the world to do hip replacement surgery with minimal invasive techniques thanks to this equipment." H21026