Work begins on hospital’s new theatre development

Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust has started work on a new children’s cardiac hybrid theatre and intra-operative MRI facility.

The development will create a dedicated site at Leeds Children’s Hospital for paediatric cardiac surgery and paediatric neurosurgery.

The new theatre complex will care for young patients with complex congenital heart disease, and those undergoing neurosurgery.

The cardiac hybrid theatre allows cardiac surgeons and cardiologists to perform surgery at the same time which means the skills of both specialists can be employed together, reducing treatment time for patients.

The intra-operative MRI scanner allows scans to be done during neurological surgical procedures. For example, surgeons will be able to see straight away how much of a brain tumour has been removed rather than scanning at a later date to discover that additional procedures may be required. Patients need fewer general anaesthetics, MRI scans and surgical procedures.

Matthew Garnett, BAM’s construction manager, said: “The big challenge is not so much the construction as it is working around a live theatre environment, and connecting the new structure to the existing one. That has involved detailed planning about how this affects the Trust’s ongoing surgery times and our own construction programme.

“Our collaborative planning with the Trust is already proving very fruitful, and we have some positive feedback. The quality of our relationships is what drives a complex scheme like this to success.”

Simon Neville, director of strategy and planning at Leeds Teaching Hospitals, said: “We are delighted that work has started on our new children’s theatre development and are looking forward to seeing the plans come to life. This will make a real difference to the care we can provide our young patients undergoing cardiac and neuro surgery.

“I would like to thank our charity partners, the Leeds Hospital Charitable Foundation and Children’s Heart Surgery Fund, for their commitment to fundraising for this new development and helping to get this project up and running.”

The new theatre development is being supported by donations from The Leeds Hospital Charitable Foundation and Children’s Heart Surgery Fund’s ‘Keeping The Beat’ campaign.
The new complex will link directly to the existing theatres in Clarendon Wing and is expected to be open to patients in February 2019.