Hospital opens new $11m extension
Beds and the operating table in a private New Plymouth hospital’s $11 million extension were empty yesterday, but they won’t be for long.
The upgrade of the Southern Cross Hospital has been about two years in the making, and patients will benefit from the new theatre and recovery rooms at the St Aubyn St site from today.
‘‘We’re all booked up for the next couple of weeks,’’ hospital general manager Lee Mcmanus said. ‘‘It’ll be busy.
‘‘You don’t often see a hospital empty like this,’’ Southern Cross Healthcare chief executive Chris White added, while walking through the new section.
The hospital does not only take in Southern Cross clients, but also looks after ACC and district health board patients.
The project saw the car park extended, two theatres built to bring the hospital’s total to six, recovery beds doubled from six to 13, and a ‘‘sunny’’ day area upgraded to have 12 seats for post-op patients.
‘‘Which is a significant increase,’’ Mcmanus said. ‘‘It adds capacity to the region. It’s for the community really.’’
She said this increased capacity would also bring more access to elective surgeries in Taranaki. With the recovery spaces and theatres so close together, the expansion will also help everything ‘‘flow a little better’’.
The expansion was blessed in a dawn ceremony yesterday.
The second new theatre is set to be up and running in the next 12 months.
White said once that was complete, they would be running at full capacity.
He said the expansion did not only increase capacity, it meant the ‘‘complexity of procedures’’ could be widened.
White said the total cost of the upgrade was ‘‘north of’’ $11m, after adding equipment.
In past years, the private healthcare company bought a number of neighbouring properties around the hospital to make way for the expansion.
An art-deco style house built in 1933, which the company bought, was saved from demolition when it was relocated from Young St to a property near Oakura.