Hospital’s £12m elective care hub opens its doors

A £12m Elective Care Unit at Wharfedale Hospital – which reduces the time patients wait for surgery and provides protected space for planned operations to take place – has been officially opened.

Katie White, MP for North West Leeds, joined Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust’s chair Dame Linda Pollard, director of estates and facilities Craige Richardson and a range of other colleagues to officially open the facility.

She also spoke with staff, toured the new facility and learned about the 600-panel strong solar canopy in the car park which generates electricity to run the hospital.

The Elective Care Hub at the hospital in Otley creates additional operating theatre capacity away from Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust’s main acute hospital sites, increasing the number of patients that can be treated each week.

It includes two new theatres (taking the total number at the hospital to four), a recovery area, an admissions and discharge area alongside making an existing ward operational overnight.

It provides operations including general surgery, minor cancers, urology and benign gynaecology. Other improvements include the day unit and phlebotomy services moving into refurbished areas and a dedicated hysteroscopy treatment suite.

It is estimated that an additional 3,500 people per year will be seen.

White said: “It was a privilege to open the new Elective Care Hub, meeting the dedicated staff and seeing their commitment to delivering the best care for patients was truly inspiring.

“The new facilities will make a real difference to services and improve support for patients in Leeds North West. And the inclusion of renewable energy sources in the Hub, such as the solar panel canopy in the car park, will help lower emissions for a healthier planet.

“Improving and reforming our NHS won’t be quick or easy. But the government has the plan, the investment, and the determination to get it done. I’m proud to stand alongside the NHS staff I met at Wharfedale, and I will keep standing up for a better health service for everyone in our community.”

 

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