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Patients starring on TV

PATIENTS at the Garrick Hospital could find themselves taking a starring role in a medical TV series.

Up and running at the hospital is a £30,000 state-of-the- art telemedicine link with Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary.

And thanks to high-tech cameras, imaging and monitoring equipment, some patients who in the past would have had to go to the infirmary, are now treated in Stranraer.

For instead of having to see a consultant personally, the link can now be made over a special phone line.

The equipment will improve links between the two hospitals; support Garrick doctors and nurses; allow consultants and patients to link up from a distance; facilitate teaching sessions at Stranraer and enable pictures not only of X-rays and cardiograms but of patients so that injury diagn-osis and potential treatment and care can be discussed.

And as the system spreads, the Garrick can eventually be connected to many other centres.