Fern Britton opens the McIntyre Unit at Wycombe Hospital

The McIntyre unit provides spacious and modern facilities, including a refurbished reception area and three admitting rooms, giving patients more privacy, and two endoscopy rooms with adjoining decontamination areas. The rooms are fully equipped with state-of-the-art technology to help support a range of elective, diagnostic and therapeutic procedures in an environment that reduces the risk of infection.

David Gorard, consultant physician and gastroenterologist, said: “We are delighted Fern Britton will be opening the McIntyre unit where she will be unveiling a commemorative plaque. The unit has been named in honour of Dr Alistair McIntyre, who sadly died this spring. Alistair was a senior consultant whose contribution to endoscopy at Wycombe Hospital had been immense.”

Last April the endoscopy unit was awarded national accreditation by the Joint Advisory Group on Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (JAG). The accreditation was in recognition of good practice and clinical leadership at a national standard. The visiting JAG team rated the endoscopy unit at Wycombe Hospital as one of the top five in the country. In addition, following the refurbishment of the unit and JAG accreditation, Wycombe Hospital joined the National Bowel Screening Programme as an official screening centre, which is run from the endoscopy unit.

The National Bowel Cancer Screening Programme aims to detect bowel cancer at an earlier stage when treatment is more likely to be effective. The programme provides specialist nurse-led screening clinics for people who receive a positive result from their test kit.

Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust now provides two centres for national bowel screening, at Wycombe Hospital and Stoke Mandeville Hospital.

Based on information supplied by Richard Burton.