MERSEYSIDE’S world-class cancer hospital is bidding to become the first in the UK to provide pioneering treatment to blitz children’s brain tumours.

High-energy proton therapy can tackle tumours other sophisticated NHS treatments cannot reach, but it is not yet available in the UK.

It has meant patients have had to fund-raise to go abroad to have a better chance of survival.

But now doctors at Clatterbridge Centre for Oncology (CCO), in Wirral, are hoping to become the National Centre for Proton Therapy. The plans are in the early stages but it is thought such a centre would cost around £40m, based on two or three treatment rooms.

NHS bosses are now considering the proposal, which could be operational in three years.

For families and patients in the UK, the move cannot come soon enough. Mossley Hill grandfather James Mansell’s young grandson, Alexander Barnes, 5, was diagnosed with a brain tumour and had to go to America for treatment.

His mother Rosalie, 44, launched a £100,000 fundraising drive to send him and is campaigning for a UK centre.

Mr Mansell, 69, of Bridge Road, said: “Hopefully the bid will be successful because this treatment saves lives. If Alexander did not have this treatment, he probably wouldn’t be OK now.”

Clatterbridge is already the only place in Britain to offer low- energy proton therapy, and has been offering this specialist treatment, which they use to treat eye tumours, for 20 years.

Being able to “zap” tumours has saved the sight of patients and in some cases their eyes. If the centre plan goes ahead, Clatterbridge would be able to treat patients with tumours of the brain, lung and spine from all over Britain.

The therapy, able to penetrate far deeper and more precisely than normal radiotherapy, would be available to children and adults, but is especially beneficial to children as they are still growing and therefore more susceptible to tissue damage.

Proton therapy means tumours can be destroyed without harming delicate tissue around the tumour. For most cancers, such an exact blast of radiotherapy is not needed, as the area they are situated on is more robust.

But when it comes to tackling brain tumours, normal radiotherapy runs the risk of causing damage, leading to serious side effects.