East Kent’s mobile chemotherapy unit found itself thrust into the media spotlight earlier this month when a cancer unit at the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford closed.

Some patients who would have received their treatment at the hospital’s Celia Blakey Centre will be treated in the purpose-built vehicle in the car park while health bosses try to recruit enough staff to reopen the area in the main building.

The unit, named Caron after Gloria Hunniford’s late daughter and former Blue Peter presenter Caron Keating, rolled into Willesborough for the first time on Friday and the KM Group was there to talk to patients and staff.

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Resembling a small lorry, or a mobile library, the vehicle is accessed via a few steps or a lift.

Inside it’s bright, if a little cramped, although that wasn’t helped by two journalists and bags of camera equipment squeezing in among patients, family and five members of staff.

The patients sit on comfortable looking blue armchairs while they receive their treatment and curtains can be drawn for privacy, although while we were there most of the patients and nurses were chatting to each other across the room.

Video: Patients share their experiences of using the mobile unit

One member of staff revealed the chemotherapy sessions can be quite social and treatment is often followed by a chat over a cup of tea.

Some people came to pick up tablets, others to have a quick injection, and one lady was hooked up to a machine throughout our hour-long visit.

Patients with complex needs will be having their chemotherapy at the Kent and Canterbury Hospital for the next year until the hospital trust reviews its decision to close the Celia Blakey Centre.

The first patient to visit the mobile unit during its stint in Ashford was 59-year-old John Fowler from Folkestone, who has gastrointestinal stromal tumours (GIST), a rare type of soft tissue tumour of the stomach or intestines.

Diagnosed in 2007, he has already had six years’ worth of oral chemotherapy and two lots of surgery to remove the tumours and is now on ‘third-line therapy’, a tablet called regorafenib, which he says is working better than previous treatments.

For him, the move to the mobile unit has been a positive change.

He said: “There’s less waiting. I was straight in and getting the attention I require. In the main building I’ve had to wait for up to an hour before now because they have lots of people on intravenous treatment so you have to wait for a gap to appear.

“The staff are brilliant whether it’s here or in the main building. This unit is advertised in the main Celia Blakey Centre so I knew what to expect and it was a new experience.”

Jo Rockey, 60, from Kingsnorth, Ashford, has breast cancer, which has spread to a lymph node in her neck.

She had intravenous chemotherapy from 2008 to 2009 and was visiting the mobile unit to collect the tablets she is now taking.

The disabled mum says she was worried about using the vehicle but felt more at ease after her first visit.

She said: “I’ll be honest, I was apprehensive, but I’ve been reassured and I’m feeling quite confident now. I was worried about change of faces, change of location, different system. I just felt that maybe it was going to be a problem but no, it’s not.”

When asked how she felt when she first saw the mobile unit, Jo continued: “I thought it might be bigger. In my head I was thinking it would have to be quite big to cater for the number of patients that might have to be dealt with here. But it’s actually bigger than it seems from the outside.”

So what would she say to other patients who’ve received a letter saying their chemotherapy treatment will be taking place in the mobile unit?

“Don’t be worried because I’m the worst worrier and I’ve been put at ease straight away today so I’m happy and I’m smiling and I’m going to get a cup of tea!”

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Lucy Turner is one of the chemotherapy nurses working in the mobile unit.

She explained why it will take the hospital trust at least a year to recruit and train enough staff to reopen the Celia Blakey Centre and why nurses should consider making that commitment.

Lucy, who has worked in the field for a year, said: “The reason it takes so long to train as a chemotherapy nurse is because we have to understand all the treatments we are giving, what type of cancers we’re treating, how to give the treatments, the side effects and how they work.

“There are so many treatments out there and we have to know each one individually so it takes a year for this to be completed.”

And why does Lucy think the trust is struggling to find people to enter this vital field of healthcare?

“I think people might actually be a bit frightened of being a chemotherapy nurse because of what it involves,” she said. “Also, because it’s such a long process, people might feel they’re a bit out of their depth, especially if they’ve come from a job they’ve been doing for, say, five years and they know it inside out.

“When I started on the unit it was very bewildering but it’s a rewarding job and I’m so glad I’ve stuck by it. I feel privileged actually to be able to work with the patients and staff I work with.”

Although Lucy, who was a community nurse for eight years before moving into chemotherapy, is employed to help the patients, she says they help her just as much.

She added: “I find them inspirational and I hope to take their inspiration and use it myself, as a nurse, to improve my role and my quality of care.”

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Senior matron Mark Nicholls is in charge of the chemotherapy unit and said it was a difficult decision to close the Celia Blakey Centre but one that was made for the patients’ benefit.

He said: “We have a national shortage of competent chemotherapy nurses and we are feeling that in east Kent.

“For patient safety reasons we felt we had to make the decision to temporarily transfer non-complex patients to the mobile chemotherapy unit and more complex cases to Kent and Canterbury Hospital.

“We’re talking to our patients and making sure we’re getting feedback from them and supporting them the best way possible. Obviously we’re making sure they’re aware that we’re sorry we’ve had to make this decision and sorry for any inconvenience and distress it has caused.”

The Caron mobile chemotherapy unit will be at the William Harvey Hospital every Monday and Friday for a year, after which time the East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust will review its decision to close the Celia Blakey Centre.

The unit also visits Hythe, Herne Bay and Dover. Opening hours at the Cathedral Day Unit at the Kent and Canterbury Hospital will be extended until 9pm to allow more chemotherapy patients to receive treatment.

A big thank you to those patients who allowed themselves to be filmed, photographed and interviewed and good luck with the rest of your treatment.