Major upgrades coming for health facilities
Published:Thursday | May 20, 2021 | 12:13 AM
Health and Wellness Minister Dr Christopher Tufton has said that new designs done for 11 of 13 health facilities are being reviewed for final approval under the Health Systems Strengthening Programme.
The health facilities include the Spanish Town, St Ann’s Bay, and May Pen hospitals.
In addition, external upgrade designs for the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI) have been completed and the Cornwall Regional Hospital and the Western Children and Adolescent Hospital in Montego Bay will continue their buildout this financial year.
In his contribution to the Sectoral Debate in Parliament, Tufton said that Spanish Town Hospital has started to benefit from a $2.3-billion upgrade. He said that the design phase of this development has now been completed.
The Type B facility at the time of its establishment in 1952 had a 220-bed capacity. According to Tufton, the hospital now has 431 beds. However, he said that population expansion and changing health profile have resulted in significant increase in the demand for services in the parish of St Catherine.
With the planned upgrade, the minister said that new services, including urology, oncology, cardiology, gastroenterology, ophthalmology, and psychiatry would be offered to meet the new demands.
In terms of the Type B St Ann’s Bay Regional Hospital, the minister said it has started to benefit from a $545-million upgrade, which is also in the design stage. The hospital, which was built in 1929 with an initial capacity of 15 beds, currently has 308 beds.
With an increase in demand for clinical services, the new upgrade will include physical and functional reorganisation of services, a new outpatient block, expansion of radiology and a new intensive care unit.
He also announced major plans for the UHWI, saying that the Type A facility had started to benefit from a $4.9-billion upgrade of building and equipment, now in the design phase.
The planned upgrade for the 554-bed hospital will include a new six-storey, 120,000 square feet medical facility, which will accommodate an additional 40 medical and surgical beds. Improvements will also be done to the outpatient or ambulatory surgery, lecture rooms, conference rooms, upgrading of the cardiology hybrid interventional surgery room and the neonatal intensive care and administrative departments.
Turning to the Cornwall Regional Hospital, Tufton said that in the last year, the health facility had more than 12,600 admissions, of which 7,500 were accident and emergency patients. The hospital also performed more than 8,000 emergency, elective, and outpatient department services.
Tufton told his parliamentary colleagues that another phase of the construction project at Cornwall Regional would begin soon. It will include demolition and structural repairs to floors one to six and installation of roofs on floors three to six.
It was announced that the Chinese construction team was now finalising plans to return to the island in about six weeks to begin works on the Western Children and Adolescent Hospital. The only one of its kind in the Caribbean, the adolescent hospital will have a 220-bed capacity. It will also boast paediatric intensive care and high-dependency care units and will have the first paediatric emergency department on the western side of the island.