Specially designed backpacks have come as a boon for cancer patients who have to spend weeks in hospital for chemotherapy treatment. Like in the case of Nick Gall-Tomassen, aged 31, suffering from bone cancer. These days he spends his recuperation time away from the ward.

His backpack holds rehydration fluids, which feed straight into his body through a vein in his arm. Nick says this has given him a new lease of freedom. "I spend a week at the Rosenheim Wing, part of University College Hospital, London, and then I can go for four or five days to the nearby Grafton Hotel, for rest and recuperation.

"It is much nicer being able to spend time in the hotel rather than being in the hospital all the time. "I need hydration all the time because the chemicals they are putting into me for my chemotherapy are so toxic and could damage my kidneys. "So I wear my backpack during the day and when I sleep I put it on the bedside next to me.

"In the circumstances, it is the nearest that I can get to a normal life. "It has enabled me to have a lot of freedom and when I have the energy I have been able to go to the shops and buy myself a newspaper."

The hotel does not have special medical facilities, but the rooms are linked to nursing staff by an alarm. After having bloods taken and the fluids refilled at the hospital, Nick is then free to do what he likes. "I would normally walk around the shops or meet friends for lunch or dinner. Most commonly I spend time with my family or my girlfriend and her family."

Nick, who began his treatment just after Christmas, will have six cycles of chemotherapy over about nine months. He became ill last October shortly after qualifying as a personal trainer and nutritionist. "It was ironic," he said. "I had never been so fit." Nick discovered a lump on his right ankle, which was hot to the touch and swollen.

The leg became painful to walk on. A fracture was susp
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