SOME planned surgery at Noble's Hospital, Braddan, has been cancelled due to an "abnormally high volume" of patients needing intensive care.

The Department of Health said the decision has been made "to ensure that we have staff and facilities to care for these patients, to ensure that we have the capacity to admit emergency cases and as a precaution to remove the risk for patients who may have needed intensive care or high dependency care following their planned surgery".

A statement by the department added: "Individual patients affected are being contacted - if patients are not contacted then their surgery will be going ahead as planned.

"The current situation is being monitored daily and Noble's Hospital would like to reassure patients that there

remains full availability of intensive care beds for emergency admissions."