A man has said thank you to staff who cared for his friend in his last days by donating thousands of pounds he inherited.

Steve Camalapen, 58, has given £4,000 to the Margaret Centre at Whipps Cross Hospital, where his friend, Desire Laval Murugan, from Leyton, received end-of-life cancer care.

Retired nurse Mr Camalapen, of Ilford, was left the cash in his friend’s will and decided to make the donation after Mr Murugan died at the centre in June 2015.

He said: “Desire had really good treatment from the team there and he had left me some money and told me I could do what I wanted with it.

“I had known him for many years, we had both worked in health together, he had worked in hospitals the same as I had- our job was to care for people.

“I told him whatever money he left me, I would donate it, perhaps to cancer research, but in the end I decided to give it to the centre.

“I am really pleased to give it away to the place where he had been nursed so well, the staff seemed very pleased about the donation and have thanked me.”

The Margaret Centre is 12-bed unit on the Whipps Cross campus in Leytonstone, which provides specialist palliative care.

Patients are the centre are admitted for treatment of distressing symptoms, respite and end of life care for an average of seven to ten days.

The centre is run by nurses and doctors specialising palliative medicine, as well as therapists, physiotherapists and psychologists.