19.09.19
Plans for new £11.5m Musgrove Park Hospital unit unveiled
Taunton and Somerset NHS Foundation Trust have unveiled new proposals for the expansion and relocation of units at Musgrove Park Hospital, as part of an £11.5m revamp of the hospital to facilitate a new acute assessment centre.
The new centre will be created next to the A&E department and include 22 beds.
As part of the new unit, the current Musgrove Park Hospital therapies unit will be moved to a new three-storey extension.
Taunton and Somerset trust was given almost £91m from its treasury in 2018 to improve the hospital’s buildings. The remaining £79.4m was due to be spent on a new surgical centre, which would replace current operating theatres and critical care facilities.
Facilitating the new unit will require the ground floor of the hospital’s Queen’s building to be refurbished and extended in order to make the necessary room for the new assessment hub, while the neighbouring Duchess building will be extended to include the relocated therapies unit.
The hospital’s hydrotherapy pool will also need relocated to a different part of the site, the trust revealed in July.
Director of redevelopment for the trust, Ian Boswell, said: “"Musgrove [Park Hospital] was originally built during the Second World War as a temporary casualty evacuation hospital for the D-Day landings.
"These buildings were never intended to provide modern, complex hospital care, let alone 21st Century critical care and theatre facilities."
The new facilities are expected to improve patient privacy and dignity, enabling new technology to be introduced, waiting times to be cut, and recovery times from surgery to be reduced.