Green Light for New Intensive Care Unit at St. George's
Twenty bed facility will nearly double existing capacity
CGI of the new intensive care unit. Picture: Floyd Slaski Architects/St George\'s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trus
August 22, 2024
A new intensive care unit will be built at a St. George’s Hospital after the plans were approved this Wednesday (August 21). The facility will nearly double the capacity for general intensive care services, to meet increased demand.
The new 20-bed unit will be attached to the hospital’s Atkinson Morley Wing in Tooting, where neurology patients are treated. Wandsworth Council’s planning committee approved the plans from St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust this week.
The building will have staff support areas, offices, changing facilities and teaching and seminar spaces. It will nearly double capacity for general intensive care at the hospital, as it currently has 24 beds allocated for these services.
The site is currently occupied by a staff car park for the wing, with 118 parking spaces, which will be lost as a result of the development. The trust no longer needs the car park, however, as it has reorganised its parking facilities.
The trust put forward the plans after the Covid-19 pandemic highlighted the need to increase permanent intensive care capacity across the healthcare system, according to a report submitted with the application.
The report said, “There was demand for the facility arising from pre-Covid times, the Covid surges quadrupled that demand, and the trust are now in need of the facility at the earliest opportunity to assist them in delivering the healthcare expected of and promised to their South London catchment area.â€
The unit will also provide flexibility for the trust, as it could be used to ease strain on services in winter and as a temporary space for other services during construction projects elsewhere in the hospital. It is expected to be operational by March 2025.