19/11/2012 Inside Out East

Left waiting in an ambulance for over one hour. We will ask why. We

will ask why they are failing to hit targets to get patients from

other ambulance into hospital with an 15 minutes.

Parents driven abroad for unlicensed treatments.

People should not be put in that our position. I wish they could do

something. 100 years on we celebrate the birth of Britain's

first air force. We go into the Essex countryside to see how this

base has been rediscovered. We end I first came here I was gobsmacked.

The stories that matter where we Tonight we are in Norfolk. If the

year 100 children will be diagnosed with new robust, - an aggressive

cancer. -- neuroblastoma. Parents are being driven abroad to seek

treatment. On a rainy day in June a desperately ill girl is flown to

the UK from Mexico. Olivia Downie is brought back home

so that she can die at home. She had gone to a private clinic in

Mexico for treatment - for cancer. It's a trip her mother wishes she

had never made. All we wanted to do was help her

but it didn't quite work out like that. Now every time I think of

Olivia I think of the trauma on her face before she went into life

support. That's the last time we saw her alive and I don't think

parents should be put in our position. I wish I could do

something to prevent other parents being put in our position.

I think it is making false hope and false claims to patients and

parents and I can understand these patients and parents are so

desperate they would give everything they have and pay

everything if someone promised them a cure. It easy to promise but it

is difficult to stick to the promise.

Olivia was helped by a charity based here in Hunstanton in Norfolk.

We ask why parents are so desperate they are sending their children for

these unproven and unlicensed treatments.

Neuroblastoma is a cancer that affects the nervous system of

children. It is usually not diagnosed until it has spread and

the majority of children do not survive.

Olivia Downie had been ill since she was four. In June last year

doctors said there was nothing more that could be done for her in the

UK. Lauren decided to send her to a clinic in Mexico.

She wasn't expecting a miracle but to give her more time and to ease

her daughter's pain. The only real questions I had asked

was what was the worst thing it can do to Olivia and we knew it was

going to cause more pain before subsiding the pain. But she went

into a lot more pain and never came out of it. That is when her lungs

started filling with fluids. At the Hope4Cancer institute Olivia

was given an experimental drug called the BX Protocol. Impressive

claims are made about it in an online advert.

The vaccine is described as being as powerful as a forest fire.

cascades like a forest fire. You can see why parents are swayed.

The clinical director at Hope4Cancer claims to be able to

save over 20 per cent of terminal patients.

I could tell you the success rate for stage IV cancer in general. The

success rate is 70 per cent. What does that mean? That means that of

these patients in stage IV, 70 per cent of them will get five times

past their expected diagnosis. 30 oer cent of the 70 per cent go into

full term remission. It is not a claim the clinic should

make as there is no evidence to back it up.

Professor Rupert Handgretinger is a top paediatric cancer specialist in

Germany. He is deeply concerned about these treatments in Mexico.

If these clinics have something good to offer and they can really

claim they can cure cancer then they should show us the data. With

good date that and appropriate all up it would be worthwhile to go

there but we have not seen such a tough. -- such that a. I would not

recommend patients caught there. -- go there.

The charity in Hunstanton which helped raise money for Olivia is

called Families Against Neuroblastoma or FAN. It was set up

by Linza Corp who lost her son to the disease in 2009.

The charity helps families raise funds for conventional and

alternative treatments. Since the beginning of the year it has helped

three children go to Mexico. They've all since died.

It was Olivia's parents' decision to send her to the clinic in Mexico

and other families who've gone have also made that decision themselves.

Linza Corp still believes it has to be the parents' choice even if that

choice is the Hope4Cancer clinic. Why are parents travelling to

Mexico? Mexico is just one example of places that parents are having

to travel to because they have been left with no alternatives. Families

with children with Neuroblastoma in the UK have a very limited

opportunity of getting treatment here in the UK.

We are not an organisation to make decisions for people. We are just

there to support parents who have made these decisions themselves for

their child. I would argue that the problem is what they are faced with

here is that fact that so many families are in that position in

the first place. Don't you have a responsibility to

advise parents not to go to the Hope4Cancer Clinic in Mexico?

Actually, no, we don't have a responsibility to advise that

people go anywhere. I don't think any families will want to go there.

They are in a position where there are no guidelines issued. There is

nowhere they can turn for good clear advice.

As very few children survive Neuroblastoma it is unsurprising

that when parents are told their children will die they will look

abroad for any kind of hope. Unproven treatments in Mexico are

not the only choice however. Jamie from Yorkshire is six years

old and for the last three and a half years he has been fighting

Neuroblastoma. He felt quite ill, was very tired,

and he started to lose mobility in his legs. In the afternoon he was

essentially paralysed from the waist down so we knew something

sinister was up. From the local hospital in York they rushed him by

ambulance through to the oncology unit in Leeds and the following day

they carried out the MRI scan. It confirmed our worst fears.

Unfortunately he had relapsed and it was a tumour on his spinal

column. He had surgery to remove the tumour.

His best hope of survival now lies in Germany. That's because a

hospital there is running a trial that has promising results with a

form of stem cell transplant. It is costing �250,000 for Jamie to

have treatment here. Those patients who come to us who are three of

neuroblastoma cells or only have a few neuroblastoma cells, we see up

promising results although it is not long enough - hour follow up

period, half of the patients see complete remissions. Now we have to

wait long enough to see if these patients stay in remission.

Jamie's parents would not consider any treatment not backed by

established data. We have to make a decision. We

would not do that in isolation of clinical evidence and support.

Jamie is making good progress. hope for the best. It will be at

have journey. We have to balance the risk with the benefits. Some

children have come into the street and and after completing the

treatment they have been put into remission. We have to hoped that

our child will be one of those children.

Families Against Neuroblastoma is now helping the parents of a little

boy from Norfolk go to Germany to have the same treatment as Jamie.

Ryan Wright from North Washam has had the disease since he was seven

months old. There's no more treatment for him here in the UK.

Germany is his last hope. They instituted in Mexico did not

respond to as. Lauren has given birth to a baby

You if there is an inky think we should look into, send me an e-mail.

-- if there is something you think. Were later, I asked why patients

still wait too long in ambulances before getting into hospital --

later, I will ask. 100 years ago, a new fighting corps

was introduced, the RFC stomach some crews are now been uncovered

in the Essex countryside. This is one of the busiest roads in

Essex. It's the A130, linking Chelmsford to Southend and Canvey

Island. I'm in search of a largely forgotten First World War Memorial.

And here it is. Not the kind of thing you'd expect to find in a

farmer's field, next to a busy road. The inscription reads, "this spot

is sacred to the memory of Captain Henry Clifford Stroud RFC, killed

in action at midnight, 7th March 1918. Faithful until death."

But this isn't the only memorial here. Just a few hundred yards away

is another, this one to Captain Alexander Bruce Kynoch, aged just

Both men died on the same night, 7th March 1918, in the skies above

me. It was around midnight and, in the cold and the dark, they

searched for an enemy who was faster and often better equipped

than they were. Both men lost their lives serving their country in the

First World War, but they were a long, long way from the Western

Front. This year marks 100 years since the formation of the Royal

Flying Corp, the forerunner to the Royal Air Force.

Most people think of the trenches when they think of the First World

War, but there was a new kind of war that came up much closer to

home. For the very first time, Britain, and in particular, London,

faced bombing, from the air. The Kaiser gave permission in

January of 1915 for bombing areas which had some military

significance, but in July, the High Command persuaded him they could

bomb civilian areas just like that, and that's what happened. People

were appalled, astounded that these great airships could, with impunity,

simply come and bomb them. It was terrifying.

And quite often, it was our region that bore the brunt of the attacks,

as the airships and aircraft headed through the East, en route for the

capital. The first attacks came from

Zepellins, huge airships that would fly at high altitude and then bomb

at will. And in the early days of the war, it seemed we could do very

little to stop them. They did a lot of damage to

buildings and, of course, to people. There were no shelters available

immediately and this would happen suddenly. They caused a lot of

damage and a great deal of panic. That was the intention, to affect

morale. The situation was so bad, there

were even riots in some parts of the country, including Maldon and

Southend. Something had to be done, and fast. The answer - a ring of

home defence aerodromes circling London, with pilots and aircraft

ready to fly up at a moment's notice and intercept the raiders.

Today, the role those early flyers played is virtually forgotten, but

with this year marking the centenary of the formation of The

Royal Flying Corp in 1912, their story is finally beginning to

emerge. When I first came here, I was

absolutely gobsmacked, looking in the windows and seeing the original

desks, the original paintwork, that sort of thing. And every building

you go into is just more and more and more, so absolutely overwhelmed

with it and fell in love with it within five minutes flat and just

had to buy it. Four years ago, while looking for

new business premises near Maldon in Essex, Russell Savory stumbled

upon what is now known to be the most complete Royal Flying Corp

aerodrome anywhere in the world - Stow Maries. Like the memorials by

the A130, it had been hidden from view for decades.

During the Great War, who was based here?

It was B flight 37 squadron and that was then split up into three

flights. A flight at Rochford and C flight at Goldhanger. Its busiest

time in the complete build-up of it, we have some just short of 400

personnel here. They were made up of three services, that was the RFC,

RMC and the Royal Engineers. It is quiet here today, but almost

100 years ago, it must have been very different.

This place would have been absolutely buzzing. You've got the

officers in the officers' mess, you've got the officers' barracks

there, and between the officers' mess and the other rank, which

would have been very busy indeed, you'd have had all the billet

buildings here, 11 wooden huts for the other ranks to billet in.

The pilots who served here came from all backgrounds - bank clerks,

drapery assistants, engineering apprentices - and most were very

young. Stow Maries' first commanding officer, Claude Ridley,

took charge when he was barely 20, by which time, he had already been

honoured for actions over the Western Front, including making it

back to Britain across enemy lines. This place really does have a very

special atmosphere, perhaps because there is just so much still here,

much of it hardly touched for nearly a century. It is hard to

find the words, but I guess it is somewhere where the present feels

very close to the past. During The First World War, pilots

from Home Defence Aerodromes like Stow Maries took part in hundreds

of sorties against enemy raiders, but with most of the best aircraft

being used over the trenches in France and Belgium, the ones they

received were often hopelessly inadequate.

Imagine the Second World War, imagine sending Fighter Command to

intercept German raiders without the Spitfire and without the

Hurricane, that was what was down to these men. They cannot reach the

height, they haven't got the speed, and this is the complaint that one

of their officers made, that they Have you an example of a typical

day, if there was such a thing? Yes, for example, on 25th May,

there was a daylight raid, but the night before, there had been a

night raid, when six Zeps attacked London. But the adverse winds put

them off course and they went wandering about over East Anglia

for hours. Now, our pilots were called up from the three aerodromes

to go and find them, they are labouring up through thick cloud,

heavy rain, trying to find them, and even those who were driven back

by weather themselves came back down and then went up again. They

did not give up. But Zepellins were not the only danger. In 1917 came a

new terror, the arrival of huge German bombers in the skies above

Britain. Twelve hours later, at five o'clock

in the evening, there was another call, and this time, there were 23

Gotha bombers. The night before, it was Zeps, now it was bombers. They

crossed the East Coast, between the Blackwater and the Crouch, which

was just here. The squadron was in readiness five minutes later.

Among those men that went up was a Captain Cyril Cook. He laboured up

through cloud, and when he reached 13,000ft, his engine burst into

flames, and the record says he successfully extinguished it by

executing a sudden tail slide. With badly performing aircraft and

a better equipped enemy, many men paid the ultimate price. Roy

Mourtizen, 20 years old and from Western Australia, died in a flying

accident. Edward Gerald Mucklow died in an accident on the edge of

the airfield at Stow Maries. He burned to death in the wreckage.

Captain Alexander Kynoch and Captain Henry Stroud, both 24, were

killed in the skies above what is now the A130. They had been sent up

to intercept an enemy headed for the capital. In the cold and dark,

they collided and plummeted to their deaths. And it is stories

like these Russell Savory is hoping to tell by restoring Stow Maries as

a living memorial to those who served here.

So this was the officers' mess, this is where Claude Ridley would

have been in charge? It is, indeed.

And many of the original features still intact, despite the fact it's

been farm storage for many years? I think it's because it was used

for farm storage that it has survived, because it was of use to

the farmer, and this is really the hub of the officers' mess. This is

where the mess orderly would have been based, that's the reason for

the sash window. It's got the original desk in the original paint

on it, RFC green. So this is where you would have

paid your mess bill. So you couldn't get into the dining room,

or the bar, or the little quiet room, without going past this

office. And what is your grand plan?

To restore it back to its original 51 buildings, because I think we've

got 22 of the originals here, and most of the ones that have

disappeared are the wooden ones. So it is restoring the hangars and

some of the wooden hutting, but to put it all back to how it was. This

year is the 100th anniversary of the RFC, so quite an important date

for us. Indeed, some three months ago, I managed to get grade-11 star

listing on it, so effectively, we've got it saved for the nation.

And do you hope that maybe one day, Stow Maries might be as famous as

somewhere like the IMW at Duxford? Well, maybe we could be a little

bit more famous, hopefully! Formed just two years before the First

World War, its pilots soon found themselves engaged in dogfights

over the trenches of the Western Front. And planes are flying into

Stow Maries again for the first time in decades, including one very

special visitor. And as the airfield comes back to

life, aircraft are once more flying back into Stow Maries for the first

time in decades. There are now regular flying days held at Stow

Maries, with the long-term plan that this will continue to grow as

a living museum, including re- building the hangers and filling

them with WW1-era aircraft. And it's remembering those who

served here that is so important. In fact, one of the first things

that they did before work began to even restore some of the buildings

was to built this memorial to all those in 37 Squadron during the

Great War. German airships and aircraft killed more than 1,400

people during WW1, and injured nearly 3,500, but the raids also

took a terrible toll on those young men fighting against all the odds

to stop them. The planes were BEFE. The E stands

for Experimental. We must honour these men, they are the beginnings

of the Royal Air Force, they fought the first battles of Britain here.

I think it is so important that we recognise that tremendous

achievement. So if you spot an unusual memorial,

or headstone, take a closer look, and remember those young men who

paid the ultimate price in the Earlier this year, we reported on

delays with ambulances getting to people and we discovered part of

the problem was that they were being kept waiting at hospitals and

they were sometimes unable to admit patients for over an hour. The N&N

had the worst record in the east and we went back to find out if

things had improved stomach --. Earlier this year, the Care Quality

Commission - which monitors health service performance - found that

the East of England Ambulance Service had one of the most hours

lost due to delays at hospital in England. One of the biggest

problems was ambulances being kept waiting at A&E departments. This is

what we found at Broomfield Hospital, in Essex, last February.

At the moment, we're just waiting for hospital cubicles to come free.

They only have a certain amount of cubicles and a certain amount of

staff that can manage those cubicles. So until they're free, we

need to stay with the patient to make sure they're OK.

Unfortunately, that is delays building at Broomfield due to the

influx of patients coming in. So everything that goes in will just

be delayed until they've got room for them. It depends what the

delays are. At the moment, it says currently delayed handing over,

which means they're just really busy in the department.

Last week, we had one hospital in the region where 26% of patients

waiting over an hour to be off loaded from the ambulance and be

admitted into A&E. That's really really disappointing and, as you

can imagine, they're waiting in the back of the ambulance much longer

than they should do. And, of course, it means the ambulance isn't free

to get out on the road and see to the next patient. The Care Quality

Commission investigated and reported that the East of England

ambulance service must continue to reduce waiting times at hospitals.

The ambulance service said they are working with hospitals to address

this. But what are the hospitals doing about it?

Back in February, we found of all of them in the East, the Norfolk

and Norwich University Hospital had the worst delays in handovers from

ambulances to A&E. And in September, the Primary Care Trust found the

N&N still had the worst record for delays of over an hour. So what is

being done about it? Anna Dugdale is the Chief Executive.

This absolutely isn't a blame game. It's about all of the health system

working together. It starts when patients visit their GP practice,

or when patients dial 999, and it finishes when patients are back at

home, having recovered from their acute episode. So it's not a

question of just what happens at the front door, it's a question of

the whole health and social care system working together on this one.

The Ambulance Service says handover delays in Norfolk and Suffolk have

cost it more than �400,000 in lost resources. Now the Primary Care

Trust has set the Norfolk & Norwich a target for 85% of patients to be

"handed over" from an ambulance within 15 minutes. The target was

due to be met in October, so have they done it?

Are you actually hitting this target of 85%?

We are not hitting it at the moment, but we are doing a great deal of

work with the local clinical commissioning groups across Norfolk

and also with Social Services to improve the handover performance.

So and 85% may not be achievable, are other parts of the country are

getting a higher rate. Are these targets realistic, if

other hospitals in other parts of the country are getting a higher

rate, are they not realistic for this hospital?

I think it's not just this hospital, it's the whole health and social

care system. So this target is a manifestation of what's going on in

the system as a whole. If we can flow patients out of the hospital,

then it's much easier to admit patients into the hospital, which

is why we're working with the CCG to improve the whole system's

performance. $$NEWLINELet's face it, you can't be happy, as the Chief

Executive of this hospital, with that figure.

I'd like very much for the turnaround target to be better,

wouldn't we all? And that's what we're working on at the moment with

all of our partners. So what is the problem, is it that

A&E isn't big enough, not fit for purpose?

No, the size of the A&E department isn't the rate-limiting factor.

issue is when we can't move patients through the department

quickly because we can't get patients out of the back door of

the hospital. The block at the so-called back

door is partly due to patients who are medically fit to leave general

wards, but can't until their care packages are sorted out, often by

Social Services. Last week, 46 beds were blocked this way. And hospital

will be fined �70 for handover is that take longer than 15 minutes,

no penalty payments have yet been issued. Preparations are now being

made for the reorganisation of local health care and we will look

at what that would mean for all of us, in the new year.

That is it for this week, if there is anything to think we should look

into, send an e-mail to me. I will see you next week and I will be

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