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Hospital takes delivery of £30m care unit
A NEW £30million wing for Sunderland Royal Hospital will be delivered next week after it was prebuilt 100 miles away.
A monster crane will tower over the city to help install one of Britain's biggest modular buildings.
The 800 tonne machine will be erected at the Royal Hospital to assemble the five- storey building, which will have three 40-bed wards and an Integrated Critical Care Unit (ICCU).
The building consists of 108 modules contracted by Britspace Modular Buildings in a factory near Scunthorpe.
Between six to eight modules – which are 18.5 x 3.9 metres – will be delivered and lifted into position each day from Monday, for 20 days.
They will be followed by a new curved roof, to match the adjacent hospital buildings.
"Considering the size of the new building, some 9,000m2 of hospital accommodation, this is extremely fast construction," said Richard Webster, project manager for Derrick Kershaw Partnership, which was part of the design team.
"The new ward block has been so carefully designed that staff and patients will never realise that the building was built in a factory and transported on the back of lorries to the hospital," he added.
"The new wing has been designed to enhance the quality of patient care and minimise the risk of infection.
Its wards will be a combination of 12 single rooms and seven four-bed bays, each incorporating a nursing station.
"The new wards will be a flagship of patient care and medical excellence for the trust," said Jim Robinson, Head of Design at City Hospitals Sunderland.
The current ICCU, set up in 2000, cares for about 1,200 patients a year, with 100 staff offering both intensive care – those on life support machines – and high dependency, for those who need a high level of nursing care.
The new 18-bed unit will be one of the most advanced in the country and, along with the three wards, its development has generated interest throughout the NHS.
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Weather for Sunderland
Saturday 04 February 2012
Today
Light sleet showers
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