Prince visits Great Ormond Street

Young patients at Great Ormond Street Hospital had a special visitor today when the Prince of Wales toured the wards.

Charles chatted to children being treated for cancer and epilepsy at the London hospital and spent time in its complementary therapy suite.

The Prince, set to become a grandfather for the first time this summer when the Duchess of Cambridge gives birth, seemed to particularly enjoy being in the hospital's playrooms.

He pulled up a child-sized chair to chat to epilepsy patient Katie Tuffin, who was only admitted to the ward yesterday.

On being handed a tub of Play-Doh, Charles took out the green dough and promptly got to work rolling it out with a grooved rolling pin.

Eight-year-old Katie said she was impressed with the royal visitor - even though her mother, Emma, revealed that her daughter had initially thought Prince William was to be the special guest.

Charles, wearing a dark blue suit and striped shirt, seemed all too aware of the mess that can be made when Katie told him that her five-year-old brother, Oliver, mixes up the Play-Doh colours."You get annoyed by that, do you?" he asked her. "Does he grind it into the carpet?"

When Katie admitted that the siblings "sometimes" fight, the Prince gave a wry smile and said: "It tends to happen, doesn't it."