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PUTTING THE LIVER IN LIVERPOOL – CITY SURGEON EXPLAINS WHY WORK HERE IS WORLD-CLASS
Mersey Life talk to Mr Rob Jones , Consultant General and Hepatobiliary Surgeon at Spire Liverpool Hospital .
Mr Rob Jones specialises in diseases of the gallbladder and liver as a Consultant General and Hepatobiliary Surgeon at Spire Liverpool . He is also the Royal College of Surgeons UK Lead for research into bowel cancer that has spread to the liver and holds the prestigious National Institute for Healthcare Research ( NIHR ) Fellowship for clinical research and trials .
We caught up with him to find out why he feels Liverpool is a step ahead of the rest …
Tell us a bit about what you do ? Around one in three people will have gallstones in their lifetime and the majority of people don ’ t even know they have them . Sometimes they only find out when they have a scan for something , and it comes up . In this case we ’ d just leave them alone , however , I do still perform around 150 laparoscopic gallbladder operations ( cholecystectomy ) every year .
Gallbladder problems can be quite varied . Gallstones is the most common , and if the patient has symptoms , then they can be really debilitating . It ’ s primarily pain , you would have a cramping pain on the right-hand side of your tummy going through to your back which can sometimes come on after you ’ ve eaten fatty foods .
What would your course of action be then ? I ’ d advise an operation to remove the gallbladder which at Spire is usually done as a day case . If your gallbladder has stones in , then it ’ s not functioning properly and as such is going to cause the patient problems .
Amazingly , because our bodies are fantastic , the bile ( digestive juices ) that the gallbladder is there to deal with automatically trickles itself directly into the bowel , so recovery generally only takes a couple of weeks .
I ’ ve been working with Spire for about the last 18 months , but I ’ ve spent the best part of my life learning to do what I do . At Spire , I enjoy being able to help people feel much better quickly and effectively than they have been .
They can self-refer which is helping take a bit of pressure off the NHS and I ’ ve been able to give people peace of mind by explaining scan results or abnormal blood tests that they ’ ve been worried about and then they can either stay with Spire for their treatment or go back to the NHS . It ’ s a much more linked in and supportive system .
You ’ re also involved in some important research into bowel cancer , aren ’ t you ? Yes , when you become established in medicine , I think it ’ s important to have another area that motivates you and that ’ s my translational research which I ’ m working with the University of Liverpool on . Simply put , hundreds and hundreds of cancer cells will move into the blood stream of someone who has bowel cancer , but most will be killed off by our immune system , which recognises that the cell is abnormal and gets rid of it .
However , liver cancer is the most common secondary cancer to bowel cancer ; so , what we want to know more about , is why particular cancer cells from the bowel choose the liver to metastasise to . Why weren ’ t they stopped by the immune system ? What we hope is that if we can unlock the mechanism by which this metastasis happens , then we , as doctors , can do something to impact that . Can we put a treatment in place to prevent that from happening ? Is there a signature in the immune system which shows that if we tackled the cancer in the liver surgically it would be gone for good or does it show that it would come back ? It would allow doctors to create a more tailormade approach for patients .
How do you feel about the quality of medicine in the city region ? I came to Liverpool to do my PhD in 2009 and have been here ever since . I always knew I wanted to be a Hepatobiliary surgeon , and the quality of training available here in this area of study is , to me , the best in the country .
We ’ re incredibly lucky , we ’ ve got some world-class stuff going on in this city and I think it ’ s a really exciting time to be involved in science , research and medicine in Liverpool . I don ’ t think there ’ s anywhere else doing it as well as we are here .
At Spire Liverpool Hospital , our consultants have wide experience in the latest techniques and innovations and our inclusive prices and access to 0 % finance options make the process easy and more affordable . For further information on our broad range of procedures , and to find out more about our team of expert Consultants , search ‘ Spire Liverpool ’ or call our specialist advisors on 0151 391 7157 .
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