£3m New Ward For Worthing Patients Needing Respiratory Care

Monday, 13 July 2020 22:59

By John Warburton @Warblefly

A new 20-bed specialist ward is being developed in Worthing Hospital to provide modern purpose-designed facilities to improve care for patients with respiratory illnesses.

The Western Sussex Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said the new respiratory ward should open early next year.

It's expected to follow the refurbishment of 774 square metres of administrative space on the first floor of the East Wing as it becomes a new clinical area.

Lead respiratory consultant Dr. Katrine Steele said:

"We're feeling buoyed by the investment in the department.

"We have of course been very involved in the delivery of Covid care and so this is welcome good news at a time when we're all feeling tired.

"The new ward will improve patient care and enable us to provide specialist treatment in a purpose-built modern environment with better facilities.

"It's a great step forward for the department and will support us to develop other services too, including pleural and home ventilation services."

With an aging local population, the trust running the hospital said it has been seeing increasing numbers of acutely unwell respiratory patients.

To address this, the new ward is intended to provide space for enhanced medical care for the department's sickest patients.

Dr Steele added:

"We're excited about the potential for a high dependency respiratory area within the ward where we will be able to improve the care of patients with chronic respiratory conditions and severe infections without transferring them to other critical care areas.

"As a result, we hope to provide better continuity of care and improve outcomes for these patients too."

The trust said the respiratory ward development is part of its "strategic masterplan" designed, in time, to enable the development of a new, larger Critical Care Unit closer to Theatres and A&E in the hospital.

Group director of capital development and property, Robert Cairney, said:

"We're delighted to be starting stage 2 of the trust's strategic estate masterplan for Worthing.

"This £3m investment is a key step forward that both improves and expands our clinical estate.

"For example, the new ward will provide negative pressure isolation facilities for the first time in Worthing and it is a significant enabling project for the construction of a new Critical Care Unit."