THE memory of former Kent Messenger Group sports journalist Kevin Hingley has inspired his family and friends to make life a little more comfortable for kidney dialysis patients.

Just over a year after his death, they have presented a special chair to the renal unit at Kent and Canterbury Hospital.

The Bionic Universal chair is adjustable at the touch of a button, as patient Carl Cochrane discovered when he tried it for the first time.

Mr Cochrane, who runs the AV8 Helicopters company in Canterbury, and has been a patient at the renal unit for nearly two years, said: “We are well looked after here and the nurses are second to none.

“But you have to spend four hours or more sitting down to have dialysis, and being able to adjust your position in the chair makes it much more comfortable.

“I met Kevin a couple of times and I know we will always look on this as his chair.”

The chair cost about £2,000, and further donations in Kevin’s memory have gone toward the cost of telephones for patients.

Kevin, a talented and popular journalist, was 42 when he died. He worked for the Kentish Gazette at Canterbury and lived at Westbrook.

He had two kidney transplants, the first from his mother, Shirley, who attended the official presentation of the chair with Kevin’s brother, Gary, his uncle Michael, aunt Carol and cousin Julie, his daughter Megan and her mother, Sarah, and colleagues from the KM Group.