Hospital extension weeks away from opening

2 hours ago

Gavin McEwanLocal Democracy Reporting Service

News image — A new multi-million-pound extension at Hereford's County Hospital is nearing completion

Google Maps The outside of Hereford's County Hospital. The image is taken from the road side outside the A&E department. The hospital's façade is made up of red brick and grey cladding panels. A small roof with pillars extends out over the car park. Several yellow ambulances are parked beneath it with at least four cars parked in the car park facing away from the hospital. — A new multi-million-pound extension at Hereford's County Hospital is nearing completion

A new £5.5m extension to Hereford's County Hospital, complete with a new operating theatre, is set to open in the coming weeks.

Wye Valley NHS Trust said the two-storey modular extension would address its current lack of capacity, particularly in surgical theatres.

The trust's capital planning officer Christian Homersley explained the hospital's current layout had "increased waiting times" and led to "some Herefordshire patients needing to have their surgery elsewhere".

He added: "Expanding the main theatre block will provide much-needed additional theatre capacity to reduce waiting times and ensuring all Herefordshire patients can have their surgery locally."

According to plans, this will include elective Caesarean sections, gynaecology and breast surgery.

Previously the hospital had made use of a "mobile theatre facility" based for a year at the same spot. The planning application for the new provision described this as "essentially an articulated lorry trailer".

The extension has a total area of more than 400 square metres and will be finished in slate grey cladding panels, with solar panels on the roof.

The first patients through the doors are expected from late summer at the earliest.

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.

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