A JUNIOR doctor had worked 43 hours without a break before he had to carry out an emergency operation

A court heard that Mark Dayer had to insert a tube into Brighton teacher Richard Lewis's neck to give him oxygen to revive breathing. It was the first time he had attempted such an operation.

Despite this procedure and other attempts to revive Mr Lewis, he slipped into a coma and died eight months later.

The 47-year-old physics teacher, who worked at Dorothy Stringer School in Brighton, had been brought into the accident and emergency unit of Worthing Hospital after he was attacked by Worthing teenager Sam Brown at the Montague pub in Shoreham High Street in May 1997.

Brown, 18, has already

admitted assaulting Mr Lewis, causing grievous bodily harm, in a previous trial. He is now on trial for murder at Lewes Crown Court.

The court was told Dr Dayer was a senior house officer at the hospital and had been a fully registered medical practitioner for less than a year when the emergency happened.

Around 3am, after Mr Lewis had been X-rayed, Dr Dayer was called to the A&E resuscitation room. He said the teacher had a weak, slow pulse and was not breathing.

A more senior registrar was working in an operating theatre and an ear, nose and throat specialist who could have carried out the tracheotomy was on call in Chichester, more than 20 miles away.

It was left to Dr Dayer to carry out the procedure even though he had been on shift, without sleep or a proper break, for almost two days.

He said: "We could not get any air or oxygen into the patient so I had to perform a tracheotomy.

"I hadn't done that before. Nobody in the room had. It is not a procedure very often used."

Earlier the court heard evidence from Elaine Homer, of Portslade, a close friend of Mr Lewis who was called to Worthing Hospital shortly after he was admitted.

Describing what Mr Lewis had said to her about the attack, she said: "He told me he had been in a pub and a gentleman walked in and he was being a bit loud to the women. Richard said he had said 'come on, cool it, man' and the man went for him in a big way. He said he was like an animal."

Brown denies murder. The case continues.

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