A MELKSHAM man suffering from a life-threatening illness on holiday in Spain has finally been told he can be flown home to be treated.

Despite having comprehensive health insurance Chris Carr, of Kingfisher Drive, Bowerhill, and his wife Sally have had to fight to get a hospital bed in the UK where he can receive the correct after-care the Spanish hospital does not offer.

They were told by insurers Aria Assistance and Intana, the company organising his repatriation, that no hospital in the South West had a bed for him, leaving him stranded abroad.

The 62-year-old fell ill nearly two weeks ago during the caravan holiday the retired couple have been on for several months and Spanish doctors diagnosed Mr Carr with a rare condition called diaphragmatic hernia.

Both the doctors and medical insurers agreed he should return home to have an operation which may involve removing part of his stomach.

However it has taken an online campaign by upset friends and former colleagues at Bath University before Mr Carr was told on Tuesday he can have the operation at the Royal United Hospital in Bath later this week.

In the meantime Mr Carr has been staying at a hospital near Benidorm, being fed through a tube, he said: “I feel very pleased that I have some very good friends and ex-colleagues who have come together and helped me out of a situation I couldn’t see a way of getting out of.

“The local doctors in Spain have been superb. It would just be nice to be able to talk to somebody who is English about my condition, because it is so abnormal and rare.

“I could have the operation here but it is the recovery process which could take weeks or months and the Spanish after-care system is not as advanced as in England.”

Although he has been told he will be flown by air ambulance on Thursday and should arrive in Bath by the afternoon, he is not getting his hopes up too much having already face an agonising week of uncertainty.

“I have all my fingers and toes crossed,” Mr Carr added. 

“I just want to come home.”

In statements the RUH and the Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust both spokesmen say they have no records of being contacted about admitting Mr Carr from the hospital in Spain or his insurers.