Work progressing on multi-million new mental health inpatient facility | News and events

A £49million project to develop three new state-of-the-art wards and refurbish two existing wards at The Rivers Centre, Hellesdon Hospital, Norwich, takes an exciting step forward this week.

Earlier this year Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust secured £38m national capital funding to modernise inpatient mental health care at the site for the benefit of patients, their families and carers, and trust staff. That funding, alongside £11.7m of NSFT investment, marks the single largest capital investment to improve facilities at the Trust.

This month building contractors IHP, the Joint Venture between VINCI Building and Sir Robert McAlpine, a leading provider of healthcare solutions, began the next phase of work, delivering the steel that will form part of the structural frame of the new building, having spent the last few weeks clearing and preparing the site.

This much-needed investment will deliver modern, purpose-built environments for people who need specialist inpatient mental health care. It will also provide additional capacity, allowing the Trust to support a further 15 working age adults who need hospital care.

The additional bed capacity will reduce the current high dependency on out of area and independent sector placements for people in the area who need inpatient mental health care, treatment, and support.

This investment will play a significant role in enhancing care for local people recognising wherever possible people needing inpatient care should receive care in a facility as close to home as possible.

It will provide a much-improved environment to the existing ward environments that are being replaced, which suffer from poor lighting, a lack of quiet space and poor access to outside spaces – issues which have been previously highlighted as part of CQC inspections.

Cath Byford, Deputy Chief Executive and Chief People Officer said “It is great to see our plans coming to life on this much needed development for out Trust and those we provide care for.

“I’d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone involved in this project; staff, those who use our services and our project partners – the continuing hard work, passion and dedication from all involved really is starting to show as we begin this exciting next phase of building work.”

Jonathan Payne, VINCI Building’s Regional Managing Director said: “We are extremely pleased that IHP have been awarded this project and have commenced works on site. We look forward to working with the Trust, our consultants, subcontractors, and suppliers to deliver this much needed new facility”.

The new wards are expected to be open for the first patients to receive care in Autumn 2024.