Heart surgery stands as one of the great symbols of medical achievement.

More than 40 years after experts seriously started asking "what if", surgeons now transplant human hearts and intricately repair damage caused to this vital organ.

The Royal Sussex County Hospital, in Brighton, is one of only two in the South-East where specialists use a remarkable surgical device.

Called the octopus, it allows surgeons to keep the heart beating while they perform bypass surgery to correct problems.

The trend to date during these procedures is for the heart to be stopped and its functions mechanically mimicked through a heart-lung machine.

At the end of this month, specialists from across the country will gather at the University of Brighton for a heart care conference organised by the Sussex Cardiac Centre, based at the Royal Sussex.

Uday Trivedi, a cardiothoracic surgeon at the Royal Sussex, will talk about the merits of the octopus and its status in medicine of the future.

He said: "The octopus has been very good. Our nursing staff say patients are recovering more quickly and we have got some fairly high-risk cases."

Although heart-lung machines have commonly been used, Mr Trivedi says there is increasing evidence that for certain people there are subtle side effects, such as problems with memory and lung and kidney function.

"We hope this will avoid these side effects. I think it will become increasingly popular."

The name is derived from its eight suction caps, which are used to isolate the damaged area for surgeons to work on while the rest of the heart keeps beating.