TO BE told you are suffering from cancer must be one of the most frightening and devastating moments of anyone's life.But the age of modern medicine gives people hope and a chance at a future that years ago they may not have had.

TO BE told you are suffering from cancer must be one of the most frightening and devastating moments of anyone's life.

But the age of modern medicine gives people hope and a chance at a future that years ago they may not have had.

While going through the turmoil of treatment and surgery, surely the thing people need most to help them cope is to be near their home and their families.

If cancer patients have to travel to Norwich for their surgery this one comfort will be taken away from them.

There is already a fantastic oral and maxillofacial department at Ipswich Hospital with top surgeons who treat the people of the town and the surrounding area.

The new NHS choose and book system which gives patients the choice of where they want to have their operation on what day is already failing in Ipswich. No-one is bothering to use it in the area because there is only one place they want to be treated - Ipswich Hospital near to where they live.

Perhaps the NHS should put even more focus on the things that are really concerning people, such as the lack of nurses, cleanliness, hospital diseases and the crippling debts faced by hospital trusts country wide.

Why must they try to fix the good parts of the NHS that don't actually seem to be broken?