A NORTH-EAST man has told how he helped desperate medical staff treat the injured in the wake of the Bali bomb blast.

Nick Burgoyne, from Yarm, near Stockton, said he heard the noise and headed to the scene.

Mr Burgoyne, 38, a photographer, lives two miles from the holiday resort of Kuta beach where the explosion occurred.

Doctors were without basic drugs or equipment at the main Sanglah Hospital, in Denpasar, where many of the injured were being treated, he said.

Mr Burgoyne said: "A lot of the westerners have been evacuated, but the ex-pat community over here have been working to assist the Balinese.

"The hospital is massively under resourced, so we were yesterday helping the surgeons where we could.

"It was horrible. People were screaming as there was no anaesthetic.

"I was helping an Australian doctor who had been on his holiday.

"He was literally only using a scalpel blade without a handle."

Mr Burgoyne said he and his friends hoped to start an appeal to raise money for new hospital equipment

"The hospitals need money pouring in and new equipment," he said. "Today we've just been running backwards and forwards just to get desperately needed supplies.

"Things are just so bad over here and the people need help," he said.