Ribbon-cutting ceremony held for new Emergency Department

Last week, Friday 19 July, we held a ribbon-cutting ceremony to mark the development of the new Emergency Department at Great Western Hospital, joined by members of our local community, staff and partners from health and social care and construction.

The development is the biggest investment to healthcare in Swindon since the hospital first opened, and followed the opening of the Urgent Treatment Centre and Oxford University Hospitals Radiotherapy Centre on the GWH site in 2022.

The new £33.5million facility was made possible after the Trust successfully bid for funding back in 2018, alongside other capital allocated by the Trust and Brighter Futures, our Trust charity.

After securing the money in 2023, construction started immediately and the new Emergency Department has been built in just 15 months.

The new Emergency Department, which has been delivered by Vinci Building and IHP, has a 60% bigger footprint, with more majors cubicles, four more resuscitation bays, two relatives rooms and a new patient health and wellbeing space.

Teams have worked with communities including those with dementia, a learning disability or autism, young people, mental health services, wheelchair users and more to ensure that the Emergency Department is inclusive and accessible for all.

Each majors cubicle has individual environmental controls, there are lowered spaces at reception desks for wheelchairs, calming palette colours for those with dementia and sky ceilings throughout, to bring the outside, in.

Liam Coleman, Chair of the Trust, said: “Our new Emergency Department is a modern, fit-for-purpose building which will enable clinical teams to treat patients in the best possible environment.

“Today wouldn’t have been possible without the incredible support along the way of a number of people and organisations, and I’m looking forward to seeing how our teams can really lead the way in the delivery of urgent and emergency care in this fantastic new space.

“It’s well-known that the health and care system is extremely busy and has been under significant pressure for some considerable time. In fact, when the hospital first opened the ED was designed to care for 48,000 patients a year, however we routinely see over 100,000 – more than double.

“Whilst we know that a new building won’t solve all the issues the system is experiencing, it does give us the chance for our fantastic multi-disciplinary teams to work together with colleagues from across the health and social care system to give patients the care they need it when they need it, and in the right place.”

Russell Flowers, Regional Director at VINCI Building and IHP said: “IHP is extremely pleased and proud to have completed the new Emergency Department for Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. It’s been important to the whole IHP team to ensure that whilst we delivered two new state of the art facilities, initially the Urgent Treatment Centre, and now the new Emergency Department, we enabled the rest of the hospital to function normally.

“I would like to thank everyone that has contributed to this new Emergency Department for their hard work and attention to detail, which has resulted in a superb facility.”

Final works will now be carried out on the building before it opens to the public in due course.