Part of a teenager’s leg has been treated at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham as part of a pioneering operation.

Matthew Willey had a 12-inch piece of his shin bone removed at the city’s Royal Orthopaedic Hospital after the 15-year-old boy was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer.

It was then taken by the surgeon to QEHB some three miles away where the tibia was irradiated to tackle the cancer.

The bone was then put back into his leg while Matthew was still on the operating table, and a metal frame inserted to hold the damaged limb together.

After ten days in hospital in Birmingham, Matthew returned home to Yorkshire and restarted chemotherapy at Leeds General Infirmary. He is due to finish at Christmas but will carry on being treated with a new bone cancer drug, which is said to significantly boost survival rates.

Dad Will said: “We were relieved they were going to save his leg because the feedback at first was that he was going to lose it. It’s better to have your own bone in there than a metal pin, and it will knit back together.”

Mum Julie said it had been an “awful” ten months since he was first diagnosed in January, followed by a bout of chemotherapy and then his 10-hour operation in July.

But she added: “He has never once given in. He’s been as brave as anything.”

Dr Simone Wilkins, Matthew’s consultant at Leeds General Infirmary, said: “In Matthew’s case, surgeons used his own bone which was removed, treated with radiotherapy and replaced, which is a technique which has been used for the last couple of years to try to avoid amputation.”