My anaesthetist really helped me overcome a little bit of my anxiety when he pulled his mask down and said, you know, we are we are all human behind this.

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And I suppose it's about having those techniques that personal touch and being more prepared overall about your surgery that can really help. I think the things that we could do to make patients on the day feel more comfortable is make them realise that we're just obviously humans as well. And we've had operations and understanding anxiety, anxieties that they're going through and try to make the whole situation less rigid and clinical.

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They're essentially being fed into a production line. You know how many cases we can get through each day. But it's important to remember that this is their unique day. We have to address those anxieties. And actually, the way that I do it is I talk about something else. Once we've done all the business parts, I like to talk about where they're from, what they do for work. Some people do amazing jobs and we don't want any size because it's so interesting.

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We talk about their family and we talk about who's going to look after them. And then we tell them we're going to look after them whilst they're asleep, just as they're going off to sleep. And we normally say to them, you know, where was the last place they went on holiday?

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They tell me they've been on to a beach in Spain. And they think about the beach in Spain, because then as you go off to sleep, that's what you're dreaming about. And it's interesting because lots of them wake up and then they're like, oh, I had that wonderful dream about that beach in Mallorca.