Charity presents Shropshire hospitals' trust eye department with state-of-the art scanner

The gift from the League of Friends (LoF) of the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital has paid for a ‘Optos California ultra-wide field retinal imaging system’, which will make The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust’s Ophthalmology Service one of the first few in England to use this latest version of the Optos imaging system.

A plaque was also unveiled in the waiting area of the Eye Department to highlight the support of the LoF which has donated more than £200,000 towards medical equipment and clinical furnishing of the department.

The machine specialises in capturing in detail a large amount of information about a patient’s retina - up to 80 per cent in a single image, while traditional imaging systems for eyes can only see around 15 per cent in one image. This will increase the efficiency and resilience of the medical retina service at SaTH.

Hayley Flavell, Director of Nursing at the Trust (SaTH), said: “We are grateful for the support of the LoF. This new equipment will be of massive benefit to our patients and is a huge step forward for eye care.”

Richard Steventon, the LoF of the RSH Executive Chairman, said: “The League of Friends received a bid from the Ophthalmology Team last October, via a lead consultant and centre management, to fund a widefield camera system.

“The Board was unanimous in agreeing to fund this equipment due to the advanced feature of now allowing for wider field images in one shot. Therefore, giving better patient outcomes.”

Devaki Nayak, Consultant Ophthalmologist at SaTH, said: “The new ultra-wide field retinal imaging equipment allows for more comprehensive acquisition and review of images in one multimodal imaging system”.

The LoF raises funds through generous donations, legacies, profits from all four of the LoF hospital shops situated throughout the RSH, which are run mainly by volunteers plus numerous fundraising events held throughout the year around the county.