FAMILIES who faced long waits in intensive care while their loved ones were being treated, have helped transform a hospital unit by donating thousands of pounds.

Staff and families gathered at the Royal Gwent Hospital yesterday to reveal the newly-transformed relative rooms in the hospital’s Critical Care Unit (CCU).

The rooms have been fitted with new furniture, a new coffee machine, stunning wall murals and a ‘thought box’ to allow emotional release for relatives.

Medical director of Aneurin Bevan University Health Board, Dr Paul Buss officially launched the project with a short speech.

He said: “When you are a relative of someone who is in an intensive care unit, your emotions are very, very ragged. They alter from minute to minute between hope and worry and despair.

“Sometimes you need a place where you can go and you can reflect with your family members and sometimes on your own.”

He added that the rooms were “long overdue” and will “add value” to the experience of patients and their loved ones.

Sam Annetts, 46, of Machen, spent time in the CCU in 2015 when her husband Paul developed sepsis from gall stones and spent 17 days in intensive care, 10 in a coma and five-and-a-half weeks in a ward before making a recovery.

Mrs Annetts said that “sitting in rooms for hours on end was torture” and that it was like “being in a prison”.

Together with their son, Tomos, who fundraised for the unit at the Cardiff 10k, the family raised more than £1,000 for the new rooms.

Mrs Annetts said she wanted to “give something back” and praised the thought box and murals which portray calming nature scenes.

“It just takes you away and you know there’s something beyond those mountains,” she said.

Stacey Brass, of Designs by Stacey, created the murals and has done similar pieces in the past at Orthopaedic units at the Royal Gwent.

She explained that the goal was to create imagery “you could drift away into” and added she “hopes it makes a difference” to patients.

The family of former Bassaleg School pupil Sam Ashe also attended the opening, after donating nearly £5,000 to the CCU.

Sam Ashe was just 19 when he sought to take his own life on November 25 last year and died at the hospital unit later on December 14.

His family, of Rogerstone, slept in the CCU relative rooms during Sam’s treatment and funeral donations to the unit, in lieu of flowers, were donated following his death.

“We recognised what would help, having gone through it ourselves,” father Wayne Ashe added.

The family have also set up ‘Nineteen’ - a foundation to raise awareness of mental health, particularly among younger people.

For more information, visit: nineteen.org.uk