Health centre works starts
 |
| Cutting the first sod, Sir Michael Pitt, Chairman of the Strategic Health Authority, with John Williams, of developers Kiel, and Penny Harris of South Gloucestershire PCT at the West Walk Surgery in Yate, starting the work on the new clinic to be built on the site GSR307V08 |
CONSTRUCTION work on Yate's new £12.5 million community health centre has begun after a turf-cutting ceremony.
The facility is being built on the town's West Walk GP practice and is set to be open to patients by autumn next year.
The centre will provide all existing GP services and house a children's centre, new outpatient department, minor injuries service and diagnostic tests.
It is expected to save around 34,000 people in South Gloucestershire having to travel to hospital.
Chairman of NHS South West Sir Michael Pitt cut the first turf at a ceremony last Thursday.
"It is a great honour to launch such an exciting project for the people of Yate," he said.
"People tell the NHS they want top quality healthcare facilities close to home and this is exactly what the new centre will provide."
Penny Harris, Chief Executive of South Gloucestershire Primary Care Trust said: "After many months of planning, the cutting of the first turf will mean building work will actually begin on an exciting new health centre and children's centre.
"This will be a dawn of a new era for people in Yate who will have a purpose built centre when it opens in Autumn 2009.
"They will be able to have tests, outpatient appointments and a minor injuries service in Yate rather than going to a large hospital."
The new centre is part of a network of community hospitals and centres being developed throughout South Gloucestershire, Bristol and North Somerset as part of the Bristol Health Services Plan.
A new specialist major hospital is being developed for Southmead.
The children's centre will enable the local authority and Connexions staff to work closely with health colleagues to provide support to children, young people and their families.
While work is underway on the centre, the West Walk GP practice is operating from temporary buildings in the town's leisure centre car park.
2:05pm Thursday 27th March 2008
Print 
Email this 
Comment
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
