Kidney unit plan for West Berks hospital

Newbury and Thatcham Hospital Buildings Trust has applied for permission for a two-storey Renal Dialysis Unit at West Berkshire Community Hospital.
If approved, the unit which will built in the hospital's grounds in Rooke's Way, will be able to treat up to 10 patients who currently have travel to Reading’s Royal Berkshire Hospital for treatment.
The Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading has confirmed that it current has 24 patients from West Berkshire using its dialysis unit.
Secretary of the Newbury and Thatcham Hospital Buildings Trust, Nick Galbraith, who was instrumental in fundraising and setting up the hospital in 2004, said the unit was “good news for the community.”
He said the trust had been talking about the project for around two years and that the unit would be very important to the community as national dialysis figures were increasing by about four per cent a year.
He said: “It’s very important for those patients needing dialysis.
“Very shortly, the existing unit will be stretched and that’s why we are trying to get one at West Berkshire Community Hospital.
“It will be great – a thing for the future.”
He said exactly how to fund the unit was one of the points still under discussion.
Kelly Bazzichi, aged 26, who lives in Newbury, suffers from a rare form of kidney failure.
She is currently on a clinical trial for a drug which has given her a lifeline, however, when she was first diagnosed in 2011, she spent four months confined to hospital and was told she would not live past the age of 60.
If her clinical trial drug is not given funding, Ms Bazzichi will find herself in hospital having plasma exchange everyday and then dialysis every other day.
On the plans, she said that a local renal unit would be a money saver as kidney patients did not work and they had to pay travel expenses several times a week for their treatment.
She said: “Having a unit in Newbury would be amazing.
“You are there for a good eight hours every time and then you face the prospect of a 45-minute journey home from Reading.
“It would be so much easier to have one in Newbury; it would be so much help.”
William Barrington of Inkpen, who has several families members in renal failure, said: “I know first hand the impact on their lives of dialysis.
“The provision of a local dialysis unit would have significant beneficial impact on patients lives.”
The chairman of West Berkshire Council's health and wellbeing board, Graham Jones (Con, Lambourn), added: "An extension of renal dialysis services closer to the community is very welcome.
“This will make many patient's lives much easier.”
West Berkshire Council is expected to make a final decision on the plans in early August and it is likely local fundraising will be needed to help.
The Berkshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust did not respond when asked how much the unit would cost and who would pay for it.