New treatment for cancer victim (From Wiltshire Times)

New treatment for cancer victim

8:26am Tuesday 13th November 2007 in Melksham By Charley Morgan

A WEST Wiltshire man has benefited from a new technique in prostate surgery being offered to patients at the Royal United Hospital in Bath.

Geoff Cary, 53, a communications engineer from Whitley near Melksham, was diagnosed with prostate cancer in September and was offered a range of treatment options.

The married father-of-two chose to undergo a laparoscopic radical prostatectomy (LRP) - a form of keyhole surgery only offered in a few UK hospitals.

He said: "I chose LRP because the side effects were likely to be significantly less that with normal surgery.

"I have to say the whole experience was far better than I had expected.

"I have had no pain at all during or since the surgery and although I felt quite weak, I was happy to go home on the evening of the third day.

"Since then I have been recovering rapidly and was back to cycling after three weeks and returned to work part time after five weeks."

LRP is a procedure developed by French surgeon Professor Richard Gaston.

Two of Bath's urology surgeons Jonathan McFarlane and Graham Howell have visited his unit in Bordeaux to train with him.

To complete their training process one of Prof Gaston's colleagues has been visiting Bath regularly to supervise the first 30 operations.

The availability of LRP at the RUH means that it is now one of the few hospitals in the UK to offer all treatments for prostate cancer on one site.

To date, 20 patients have been operated on successfully.

Prostate cancer is the most common type of male cancer in the UK with some 35,000 new cases diagnosed each year and more than 10,000 men dying of the disease.

The RUH has seen a doubling in the number of cases over the past five years.

Mr McFarlane said: "The introduction of keyhole prostate cancer surgery at the RUH is a big step forward, allowing us to offer state of the art treatment which will greatly benefit men in this area."

Mr Cary paid tribute to the team at RUH and said: "This is a real National Health Service success story.

"I was in a modern ward, which was well equipped with lots of staff who were all professional and all very friendly - I couldn't have asked for more.

"There is only one word for Mr McFarlane, Miranda Benney and the Chesleden team - excellent.

"I am most grateful and hope that if I ever require hospital treatment again it is of a similar high standard."