This follows the investment of £530,000 in improvement work at Belford Hospital last year and further work, costing around £90,000, is planned for this year.
The first departments to be rewired will be Outpatients, the Emergency Department and the Theatre Suite, with work starting on January 30, and contingency plans are in place to keep the impact on patient services to an absolute minimum.
To enable these improvements to take place, services carried out in these departments are being relocated between the following dates:-
• Outpatient Department - Monday January 30 to Friday February 10
• Emergency Department - Monday February 13 to Monday February 20
• Theatre Suite - Monday February 27 to Monday March 12
Marie Law, who is Clinical Services Manager at Belford Hospital, said: “No clinics will be cancelled due to the work. Most of the 31 clinics due to take place during this period will be relocated to other locations within the Belford, two will move to Fort William Health Centre and some will be rescheduled.
“Patients attending the clinics being relocated within the Belford will be informed of this on their arrival at the hospital and patients who are attending clinics which are being relocated to the health centre will be notified beforehand.”
She added that, while work is carried out in the Theatre Suite, surgical activity will be exclusively endoscopy and minor surgical procedures.
“All major elective surgery will be undertaken in the week before the theatre is closed and the High Dependency Unit at the hospital will be converted for use as an emergency operating theatre to ensure we can still provide emergency surgery during the closure period,” said Mrs Law.
NHS Highland Estates Manager, Alastair McKenzie, said: “As the hospital is now some 50 years old, NHS Highland is undertaking a modernisation programme to improve the power and lighting infrastructure.”
He explained that phase one of this work, which involved replacing the main switchboard and distribution cabling from the main switchboard to the distribution boards in each department in the hospital, was completed by March 2011.
And NHS Highland is now embarking on phase two, which involves replacing the departmental distribution boards and the wiring from these boards to the individual circuits serving power and lighting in each local area.
The work is being carried out by contractor G&A Barnie Building Services, who successfully completed phase one of the electrical rewiring work.
Mr McKenzie said: “The first areas to be rewired will be the Emergency Department, Outpatients and the Theatre Suite as these are key areas in managing critical care of patients.
“The contractor will adopt shift working to enable work to be carried out continuously, thus keeping the overall period that each department needs to be closed to a minimum.”
Ends
Notes to editors:-
Details of other improvement work carried out at Belford Hospital in 2011:-
• Replacement of windows £110,000
• Replacement of roof coverings £170,000
• Replacement of steam boiler plant £40,000
• Provision of new Laboratory £80,000
• Replacement of main electrical switchboard £130,000
Total £530,000
Other work to be completed in 2012:-
• Replacement of passenger lift £75,000
• Replacement service lift £15,000
Total £90,000
