SWINDON-based eye doctor Hani Hasan has been awarded a medal for being a top performing student.

Hani received the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Medal in Clinical Ophthalmology after achieving a Master of Surgery degree at the University of Edinburgh.

He has worked for the Great Western Hospitals Trust for four years. He said: “It was so exciting when I found out I had won the award. It was such an achievement and a boost to my confidence as well. I’m glad that the work we are investing in is having a direct impact on improving our patients’ experience and care, and that we are able to train new students much easier.

“This also makes it better for the patient, who can be more involved in their diagnosis and treatment. I could not have done this without my supervisors and everyone else in the team though, they were all so supportive during my master’s programme.”

He was involved in the introduction of a specialist teaching suite, which uses world class technology to help experienced clinical staff support students during their training.

A trust spokeswoman said: “During his career at Great Western Hospitals, Hani has been instrumental in a number of programmes designed to improve the quality of care that patients receive, as well as encouraging a culture of learning between staff and students. He has been a lead in the training of nurses to administer intravitreal eye injections, which previously only doctors could administer. Now, nursing staff make up 90 per cent of the workload and are leading the way in nurse-led eye injections in the south west.”