• From August 17, 1990

Kingston Hospital forged closer links with trouble-stricken Romania after health chiefs agreed to a twinning with a medical centre in Constanta.

The brainwave of Kingston midwife Mrs Val Russell, the link followed a visit by two Romanian doctors to the hospital in June and the setting up of a medical education training programme.

The friendship between the two towns began earlier this year when Mrs Russell and her husband John travelled to Romania with a medical team and two 38-tonne trucks full of supplies, following the fall of dictator Nicolai Ceausescu.

During their stay the team visited the recipients of the supplies, the country hospital in Constanta, a premature baby unit, the children’s Aids hospital and an orphanage.

Mrs Russell said: “The conditions were very primitive. There was a desperate lack of equipment in all units, a shortage of staff and far too many patients.

“We decided that we should appeal to bring doctors and nurses to England, buy medical textbooks and purchase some ambulances containing resuscitation equipment.”

Consultant anaesthetist Dr Constantine Braga and cardiologist Dr Elvira Crain arrived at Kingston in June and were shown the various units, gaining valuable information to take back to Romania.

Mrs Russell added: “We wanted to feel we could help them and form a good relationship without the hospital thinking we were just looking down on them. The two doctors were so enthralled.

“We hope to be able to assist by providing training attachments for doctors and nurses from Constanta Hospital to come to Kingston to observe practices in a wide field of specialities.”

District general manager John Langan said accommodation and meals would be free for visitors and that the health authority would prepare an inventory of spare equipment, books and periodicals that could be used.

Two doctors and two paediatric nurses were the first to arrive on a three-week observation course the following month.

  • 50 YEARS AGO: August 21, 1965

It took a change of American law to bring happiness to Ailsa MacIntyre, of Worcester Park.

Twelve years of waiting ended when she learned Congress had passed a personal relief bill, allowing her to travel to America to marry her Kentucky sweetheart, William Baird.

  • 25 YEARS AGO: August 17, 1990

As the effects of the hosepipe ban began to bite there was growing annoyance at councils and sports clubs who brazenly continued to drench their land.

Thames Water Authority said the area needed two or three weeks of steady rain to recover from the drought.

  • 10 YEARS AGO: August 17, 2005

A 55-year-old businessman who broke the record for swimming the length of the Thames stopped off in Kingston for a cup of Earl Grey.

Andy Nation completed the swim in 14 days and raised £15,000 for charity and was given the cuppa by a woman known only as Jean.