A crane was brought in to perform a delicate operation at the city's new heart hospital.

Panels from the entrance of the Bristol Heart Institute and the atrium area had to be removed so that a massive magnet could be moved inside.

It will form the heart of an MRI scanner that will be used by experts at the heart centre for patients and research to improve cardiac care in the future.

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) does not use radiation like X-rays and enables doctors to see blood vessels inside the body.

The new scanner has been purchased using £1.5 million of a £5 million grant from the National Institute of Health Research.

It will be used by experts at the hospital for research into cardiac surgery, cardiology and congenital heart disease but will also give clinicians the opportunity of looking more closely at the hearts of patients who use the centre.

The scanner will be used to study different techniques used in heart surgery and how patients recover from them, how successful stem cell treatments are in repairing the heart after a heart attack and a host of other projects that are currently being undertaken by the team.

Dr Peter Wilde, director of Special Services at University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the Bristol Heart Institute, said: "The amazing thing about this machine is that you can put a patient in without any harm; there are no X-rays or injections or anything else,

"This will make us one of the major centres for cardiac research in the UK. Very few research centres have got dedicated research machines for this purpose and I think that can only be good for patients."