The new Royal North Shore Hospital has received its certificate of occupancy, meaning the main building will soon be receiving patients.

 

“With staff due to begin occupying the new Acute Services Building within weeks, this is wonderful news for the people of the North Shore and the wider NSW community for whom this hospital has long held a special place,” said the NSW Health Minister, Jillian Skinner

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“Issuing the certificate of occupancy is a contractual milestone that formally declassifies most of the project from a construction site to an occupiable building,” Mrs Skinner said.

 

The new hospital building forms part of a $1.127 billion project that consolidates 53 outdated buildings ion the St Leonards campus into new, single-purpose bbuilt facilities.

 

Adjunct Associate Professor Vicki Taylor, the Chief Executive of Northern Sydney Local Health District, said staff of Royal North Shore had been able to inspect their new work spaces and were looking forward to moving in next month.

 

“As with any move of this magnitude, there has been a lot to do but I’m confident that the rigorous work done on clinical transition and change management planning means this will go smoothly.

 

“The removalists are booked, checklists are being ticked off, and we’re now raring to go,” Prof Taylor said.

 

The Acute Services Building includes:

  • Inpatient wards for medical and surgical patients with a combination of one-bed and four-bed rooms
  • An outpatient (ambulatory care) centre
  • A new cancer care centre
  • Additional renal dialysis chairs
  • Enhanced diagnostic services and new clinical and information technology services
  • 18 new operating theatres
  • An intensive care unit with capacity for 58 beds
  • Retail and dining areas for staff and patients
  • Automated guided vehicles to transport food, linen and waste around the hospital
  • A helipad
  • Car park with 350 extra parking spaces and new roads and landscaping.  

 

The final stage of the project is a new Clinical Services Building, scheduled for completion in 2014, which will contain a new burns unit, women’s and children’s health and mental health units.