A YOUNG tattoo artist from Witney has started offering medical tattoos to people physically scarred through accidents, illnesses or in combat.

Felicity Denham, 25, became more aware of the physical and psychological injuries suffered by soldiers in battle after she started dating an army medic in 2012.

When, in the same year, a close family friend was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy, the tattooist at Hook and Eye realised tattoos could help people with permanent scarring.

Miss Denham, who has lived in Witney since she was a child, said: “I started to think about the reality of what was going on in Afghanistan.

“These soldiers serving out there during the war were just not aware that they could have work done.

“Even though cosmetics can seem superficial, it can have such an effect on a person’s self-confidence.

“If they had no eyebrows, they could have them tattooed on, or if they were missing a nipple we could do that.”

The Madley Park resident, who now lives with her partner Aarron Moore, said: “In the NHS you can get an areola tattoo but it’s not that specialised.

“They just give three choices of colour and that’s it. It doesn’t look very realistic. The NHS does an amazing job, but I thought I could do things slightly differently.”

Miss Denham’s first client was a kitchen hand who asked to have her eyebrows tattooed on after a pilot light exploded in her face.

Miss Denham said: “She was terrified to leave the house. Luckily she was wearing glasses when it happened so her eyes and eyelashes were protected but her eyebrows were completely gone.

“She was so concerned that people were judging her and looking at her. And she feared drawing on eyebrows with make-up at work in case it ran down her face with the kitchen heat.”

Despite training in cosmetic tattoos first, Miss Denham says her true passion is medical tattooing.

She added: “It’s almost like putting the cherry on the cake. The cosmetic surgeons do all the hard work and then we finish it off.

“It’s my favourite thing, working with people who have facial burns, or cancer survivors. It’s really rewarding.”

One of the people she has worked with in the past is breast cancer survivor Sheela Cousins, from Witney, who was unhappy with how her eyebrows looked following chemotherapy.

She said: “My eyebrows grew back but very thin and sparse. I am so happy with the brows that Felicity designed and tattooed for me. They’re elegant, realistic and I get many compliments.”

Miss Denham has owned Hook and Eye, a tattoo and piercing parlour in Witney, since she was 18.

She believes it is one of the only places in the area to offer medical tattoos.