AINTREE NHS staff who served in Afghanistan have met the Health Secretary Alan Johnson.

Eleven members of 208 Liverpool Field Hospital carried out life saving work in Helmand Province.

They worked alongside soldiers and provided medical aid for everything from limb-saving surgery to physiotherapy.

The Health Secretary visited University Hospital, Aintree, to promote a new scheme aimed at providing specialist treatment for deployed armed services.

The scheme, Sponsored Reservists, would allow NHS staff with key skills, such as neurosurgery, to be deployed for a short period of time without having to commit to a regular role.

Mr Johnson, said: “My colleagues and I want to pay tribute to the people who do such wonderful work under such difficult circumstances in Iraq, but particularly now in Afghanistan.

“I’m here seeking to encourage NHS employers to get more people to be reservists. We need about another 1,000, and there are some shortages within neurosurgery and after-care nursing.”

Around 500 members of the North West’s Territorial Army make up the 1,600 NHS staff who are reservists in the UK.

The Aintree Hospital staff on duty in Afghanistan, who returned last October, included senior physiotherapist Lieutenant Ruth Butler, 25, of Allerton, who helped to set up a physiotherapy unit for the serving forces.

She said: “It’s a family feel over there. I’m the youngest of three and my two older brothers were worried about me. But they would never have stopped me, they’re just immensely proud. I’d definitely go back.”

A&E nurse, Lieutenant Paul Kelly, 39, from Kirkby, was a resus trauma team leader in charge of scheduling 12-hour shifts for a team of five, including a baggage handler, a sheet metal worker, a detective sergeant and two nurses.

“Outside of work there wasn’t much else to do,” Lt Kelly said.

“There were two good gyms and a Friday film night on a laptop and speakers. The first film I saw there was Ice Cold In Alex about an ambulance of army personnel and nurses crossing the North African deserts during World War II. But they weren’t all work related!”

Reservists make up 21% of all medics in Afghanistan treating both soldiers and nationals alike.

When asked whether he thought the UK could spare these medics from the NHS, Mr Johnson said they were giving up their own time to gain invaluable experience and that reservists were essential in all areas of the armed forces.

“Employers tell us that it is beneficial and there’s no problem allowing staff to go,” he said.

“It’s the people themselves that put their own time into this, who go over in dangerous circumstances purely to help soldiers and make sure that they have a world-class health service out there.”