Building work has begun on a £15m expansion project to double the size of the A&E department at Wythenshawe Hospital.
Improvements to the new facility at the hospital, part of University Hospital of South Manchester NHS Foundation Trust (UHSM), will include larger cubicles and treatment rooms.
The two-storey building will also house two additional resuscitation bays, two new X-ray rooms and the Children’s Emergency Department will be significantly improved and expanded.
Silas Nicholls, chief executive at UHSM, said: “This is a major investment for the Trust and recognises the very specialist emergency care which we can offer to patients across South Manchester and Trafford. Once completed, this will be one of the most modern Emergency Departments in the UK, with the very latest facilities.
“The new development more than doubles the size of our existing Emergency Department and has been designed to improve the patient environment with larger treatment rooms and cubicles, as well as much more comfortable facilities for our patients and their families.”
The project will be delivered in three stages, with the first phase involving the construction of a new-build 2,000m² extension to the front of the existing department to provide new major and minor injury areas, a new waiting area and reception.
The second stage is an internal refurbishment to the existing department to provide the new resuscitation area, Children’s Emergency Department and X-ray facilities, whilst the third phase concentrates on improvements to provide relative’s facilities, offices and seminar rooms. There are more than 200 rooms within the new development, including 46 treatment rooms and eight resuscitation rooms.
The Emergency Department at Wythenshawe Hospital will continue to be open and operate as usual whilst all building work is place.
The initial extension of the building is set for completion in summer 2018, with the first stage of the refurbishment of the existing department set to be completed in late 2018. The final set of refurbishment works is due to finish in early 2019.
Wythenshawe and Sale East MP Mike Kane, who helped lay a commemorative stone to celebrate the extension, said: “For the people and patients of this part of south Manchester, it is vital they have access to the very latest, specialist emergency care when they need it most and this new development certainly signifies this and the hospital’s strong future.”
