Appreciation award for supporting bone tissue donation

9 August 2010

The pre-operative assessment team at Wycombe Hospital has been awarded a certificate of appreciation from the NHS Blood and Transplant Tissue Service, for their work in supporting bone tissue donation.

The team has been instrumental in improving the process that allows patients who are having hip replacements to donate the bone that is removed during their surgery. All patients attend pre-operative assessment before their operation, to ensure they are fit enough to have surgery, and raising awareness of bone donation is now part of this process.

Helen Bandy, deputy sister, pre-operative assessment service, said: “We are extremely proud to have been recognised for our work by NHS Blood and Transplant Tissue Service. The award was unexpected but very much appreciated by the team. It is very encouraging when your hard work is recognised, particularly at a national level”.

Helen added: “The team is committed to providing the best patient care we can and appreciation such as this helps to validate our work and motivate us to achieve even more”.

Patients who wish to donate their bone are assessed for their suitability and then a legal consent process is completed at the pre-operative assessment. The bone can then be harvested to be used in various ways for patients undergoing orthopaedic surgery.

The pre-op team has utilised all available resources to facilitate bone tissue donation, at no extra cost, and the number of patients who are donating has improved dramatically.

ENDS.

Notes to editors:

• Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust provide a wide range of high quality acute and community services from three acute hospital sites in Amersham, Stoke Mandeville and Wycombe, five community hospitals at Thame, Marlow, Buckingham, Chalfonts and Gerrards Cross and Waterside, and a number of community sites across the county. Details of these can be found here: http://www.buckinghamshirehospitals.nhs.uk/community-health-services.htm,

• Specialist services include our regional dermatology, allergy and skin cancer centre, burns care and plastics sub-regional centre, cardiac services and the National Spinal Injuries Centre

• More than 6,000 staff serve residents across Buckinghamshire, Thame (Oxfordshire), Tring (Hertfordshire) and Leighton Buzzard (Bedfordshire) - a combined population of 500,000. It serves a much larger population, 1.5m, for burns and plastic services and 14m for spinal injuries

• On 1 April 2010 Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust became the new partner to Community Health Buckinghamshire

For further information, contact the communications team on 01494 734959 or at communications@buckshosp.nhs.uk.