Newport man fixing broken phones and donating to Royal Gwent Hospital

Chris Sexton, from Allt-yr-Yn, has already given the hospital seven phones and an iPad – and he has “shedloads” left to fix.

“I can’t even imagine being isolated and not being able to chat to your family," he said.

“It must be really hard, because they can’t even see them.”

In late March, all visits to hospitals – except for children wards and births – were banned.

(Chris Sexton with his friend Jodie Harris, who works for the NHS, donating phones to the Gwent.)

“My friend Jodie Harris, who works for the NHS, asked me if I had any spare iPads I could donate and I thought, why can’t we use phones?

“Who doesn’t have a broken phone lying about?

“My friend had the disease and I had seen her a few days before she tested positive.

“I had the same symptoms and was completely wiped out. I just had the energy to hold up a phone - I don’t think I could’ve used a tablet.”

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Mr Sexton says he can spend anywhere between ten minutes and a few hours fixing a device.

(Some of the first phones that needed repairing.)

But giving patients the opportunity to either speak over a phone call or via video chat had “to be done”, he said.

“I was inspired by the guys at MouseTech,” he added.

Dario Oliver, who runs the Newport business, launched a fundraiser to donate iPads to patients at the Gwent earlier this month.

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The health and safety worker said his manager Simon Pratt, of SAS Technical, has pledged some money for spare parts, as has Hasan Ahmed of A2B Same Day Services.

And Dorel Ghincea from Electrobit and Zishaan Anwar from Zeetech have both donated hands-free kits and chargers, which are "like gold-dust".

Mr Sexton said he was thankful for all the donations, adding that “if a phone needs to be fixed, it will be”.

But he added he was inundated with messages on social media and asked that people be patient with him.