Patients have moved from three of the country’s oldest hospital wards as part of the £485 million redevelopment plans at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton, to further improve patient care.
The move, which took place on Wednesday 2 November, saw the closure of the Jubilee Building – opened in 1887 and named in honour of Queen Victoria’s golden jubilee.
The building will be demolished as part of Brighton and Sussex University Hospital NHS Trust’s modernisation project, also known as the ‘3Ts Redevelopment’ – with the three ‘T’s referring to trauma, teaching and tertiary care.
Patients who would have been treated in the Howard 1, Howard 2 and Grant wards in the Jubilee Building will now be cared for in a new three-storey ward called the Courtyard Extension.
The building stands between the Thomas Kemp Tower and the Millennium Wing, with a ward on each floor – Courtyard Levels 6, 7 and 8.
Just as the Jubilee Building had, the Courtyard wards will treat cancer patients and deliver the clinical infections service.
The Courtyard extension is a purpose-built facility, designed to meet modern standards and to achieve an improved care environment for patients and staff.
The building houses twenty two beds, eighteen of which are in single and en-suite rooms. The Jubilee Building had just eight single rooms, only three of which had their own toilet.
Duane Passman, Director of the 3Ts Redevelopment Programme, said: “The Courtyard Extension is a temporary building that is part of the 3Ts Redevelopment’s clinical decant programme. It allows us to massively improve the care environment for the patients and staff of three wards and make space for the redevelopment’s ‘Stage 1’ building work in a single move. By improving the environment for some of our most vulnerable patients, we also make it possible to create an even better environment for them and hundreds more patients in the completed redevelopment.”
Leigh Harvey, Directorate Lead Nurse for Cancer Services said: “The environment is so much better in the Courtyard. Just the sheer amount of space we have for each patient compared to the Jubilee Building is wonderful. If this is what can be done in one of the redevelopment’s temporary buildings I can’t wait to see what happens when the permanent buildings are finished.”
The Jubilee Building is the most complex structure that has to be removed to allow Stage 1 of the redevelopment to go ahead. Work to decommission it will begin immediately and demolition of the building’s shell will start early next year.
Did you know..?
In 1887, when the Jubilee Building was opened and named to honour Queen Victoria’s golden jubilee, the first Sherlock Holmes novel was also published, the Hospitals Association established the first register of nurses in the UK, and the annual salary of a surgeon was £475.
