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Specialist Unit Opens at St Peter’s Hospital
Written by Communications Team   

On Monday 6th February, the Mayor of Runnymede, Councillor David Parr, joined Ashford and St Peter’s hospitals Chairman Aileen McLeish, patients and staff from the Trust’s bariatric team, to officially open Wren, a new dedicated bariatric unit at St Peter’s Hospital.

Wren (which stands for Weight Reduction, Endocrine and Nutrition) is a 2 bedded unit on Falcon ward which has been purpose built to accommodate post-operative bariatric (weight loss) patients following the significant development of this specialist service at the Trust. Under the leadership of Upper Gastrointestinal and Bariatric Surgeon, Mr Samer Humadi, the Trust’s bariatric service has expanded from offering gastric banding and intragastric balloon procedures to the full range of specialist weight loss surgery including gastric bypass surgery and gastric sleeves. Since the first gastric bypass in September 2011, the Trust has now carried out around 30 of these specialist procedures, offering this service to a wide catchment area including Sussex, Hounslow, Berkshire and Hampshire.

 

Patient Charlotte Simmons (the Trust's first gastric bypass patient) cuts the ribbon with the Mayor of Runnymede, Councillor David Parr, to officially open the unit.


To cut the official ribbon to open the new unit, the Mayor was joined by patient Charlotte Simmons, who was the Trust’s first gastric bypass patient in September last year. She describes the surgery as having transformed her life, and to date she has lost almost seven stone.


Opening the unit the Mayor said: “The specialist nature of this service puts Ashford and St Peter's Hospitals clearly on the map as a regional centre for this kind of surgery and that's really important, both for the Trust and also for us in the local community. Not only are both Ashford and St Peter's our local hospitals for care and treatment, the Trust is also the largest employer locally and an important part of our local community. We are very pleased to see the Trust continuing to develop its services for patients, locally and from across the region.”

Wren has been purpose built for bariatric patients ensuring that appropriate space and equipment is in place to aid with post-operative recovery. Patients are admitted to the unit on a Friday afternoon and discharged home on the following Monday with an average length of stay of just three days. Surgery can be so effective that patients who arrive on a Friday suffering from (type 2) diabetes can actually be diagnosed as non-diabetic by the time they leave on the Monday.