This year sees the Peninsula Immunology and Allergy service and the Immunology Diagnostic Laboratory celebrate 30 years of delivering services to patients across the peninsula. Colleagues across the services have been reminiscing and marking some of the significant achievements over those years.

Christine Symons, appointed as the Nurse Specialist in May 1996, reflects: “Prior to the Eden Unit Clinical Immunology was a peripatetic service, we moved around the hospital filling spaces vacated by other teams. Our current home in the Eden unit finally came in to being in February 2011. We now have 34 staff members provide an immunology and allergy service for patients from across all of Devon and Cornwall. When we first started we had only 2 staff members in the clinical team but the impact was still significant as setting up a peninsula service meant that patients didn’t have to travel out of area to receive treatment.

From those humble beginnings we have grown into a centre of excellence in the European Competence Network on Mastocytosis, very proud to hold accreditation by the Quality in Primary Immune Deficiency Scheme (QPIDS), were one of the first trusts to receive the Improving Quality in Allergy Services (IQAS) accreditation from the Royal College of Physicians, and the Laboratory is accredited by the United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS).  We also participate in a number of national and international clinical research trials for patients with immunodeficiency and allergy.

Rebecca Wosley, Immunology Quality Manager said: “The Eden Unit team is tremendously dedicated and hardworking, they always go that extra mile for their patients. Both of our RCP reaccreditation reports commented on the well-functioning and cohesive team, which sees different staff groups working well together, being very effectively led, and valuing the contributions of all.”

Kam Yim Wong, Biomedical Scientist, added: “I started at Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust (as it was then known) on the  2 January 1996, the Immunology service was in its infancy then and our workload was a mish-mash covering bits and pieces from Haematology, Blood Bank and Chemistry. Later that year, Dr Kaminski joined the team and added more areas of expertise to our repertoire as well as research. It has been great to be a part of the journey and Lab development over the past 30 years”

Paul Cooper, Lead Biomedical Scientist, joined the service in November 1996: “There are a few of us still working here from those early days, I don’t know much about the service prior to my arrival but I was recruited to lead the Autoimmunity/Immunofluorescence service at a time when it had been agreed it would be centralised at Derriford with work coming from Truro and Torbay. My first month or two was learning local techniques down in Cellular Pathology which involved performing titres of samples in solid plastic blocks with dips drilled into them which were washed out between batches , and cutting all our own slides from frozen blocks of  rodent and monkey tissue we made up then sliced on the cryostat we used in Histology, putting the sections onto slides we had to coat and use a gel pen to create analytical ‘wells’ – really interesting times and great to see the services going from strength to strength in to the future!”

Prof Claire Bethune said: “Since I joined the Peninsula Immunology and Allergy service in 2004 the team has gone from strength to strength.  We have had fantastic support from the Trust over the years that has allowed us to build a brilliant team with a national reputation for excellence in delivery of clinical care and education as well as developing new research opportunities in the department. Looking to the future we want to continue to deliver all aspects of the specialised services, embracing new technologies and treatments as they become available, as well as focusing on new ways of working across the community in order to improve equity of access to the best Allergy and Immunology care for everyone in the Peninsula.”