When it comes to working in clinical settings, our experienced healthcare team understand what matters. And when it comes to complex, multi-million-pound projects, our experience, expertise, and ability to communicate and collaborate make the world of difference.
We’ve recently successfully completed one of our largest and most challenging projects to date; a multi-faceted refurbishment and build at Circle Health Group’s Ross Hall Hospital. The project’s total value was more than £10million and involved our team working on site for over two years.
As Greg Middleton, Director of Operations & Service Development at Ross Hall Hospital explains, the project was far from ordinary, ‘We literally built a new hospital on top of an already fully operational hospital. During the time of the project we still managed to perform thousands of procedures.”
So how did we deliver the (almost) impossible in a live hospital environment? It all comes down to our ability to work as part of a team, plan, communicate, adapt, and work without disrupting ongoing care for often medically vulnerable patients. This combination of expertise, skill and experience are why we’re a trusted supplier for Circle Health Group – and have already progressed with other high-profile projects.
With increased demand for private health care, Circle Health Group not only needed to expand the site to meet the needs of their patients, but they also needed a space that was safe, modern, welcoming, and which reflected their status as the UK’s largest network of private hospitals. It was a huge project, and one which had to be carried out in a live environment, as patients still needed to be treated and cared for throughout.
Our team simultaneously delivered three large-scale projects – replacing dated cladding and windows, creating new rooms/ensuites and corridors (essentially rebuilding the hospital inside the hospital, by building new rooms, repurposing spaces, and creating new clinical and utilities areas to increase overall capacity), and building the Theatre 6 extension.
The latter part of the project was delivered in just six months and was a unique challenge for our team. The extension – which included a new pharmacy as well as new operating theatres and reception area – required us to build two new storeys from ground up, extending out from the existing envelope of the building whilst working around the department’s busy reception area. In order to continue patient treatment both the reception area and existing operating theatres needed to be fully operational throughout the build. This meant that we had to be particularly careful with issues such as dust control and prevention of infection control, and often had to work non-standard hours to fit around the medical demands of the space.
Theatre 6 wasn’t the only part of the project that required extra special care. Many areas of the hospital were caring for medically vulnerable patients, including those with compromised immune systems, such as people undergoing chemotherapy. Infection risk had to be carefully managed and was a key part of our plans – again flexible working hours played a part in this, but we also set strict guidelines such as the use of screens and shoe covers and made sure that these were adhered to by everyone working in those areas of the site.
Communication, planning, willingness to adapt, and collaboration with the Circle Health Group team, and others in the supply chain (including design partners, Ikon Architecture and Bothwell Engineering) were crucial to the delivery of this project. Alan Sinclair, our Senior Contracts Manager, explains how it worked, “for a project of this scale, communication and great working relationships with the client team, and our supply partners was crucial. We held daily on-site meetings to make sure not only that things were on track and people knew what was happening, but so that we could adapt our plans as needed. We often found ourselves revising our plans to meet the needs of site users, so an agile approach was key here. We also made the most of our strong supply chain, which allowed us to make the most of our own experience, and compliment that with the skills and expertise of our trusted partners”.
Richard Saunders, of RJS Development Management, who acted as an agent for Circle Health Group, agrees that collaboration was key. “The scope and scale of this project was huge, with three major elements being delivered simultaneously, all within a live medical environment. It was a real challenge, but one that didn’t faze the Morris & Spottiswood team. Their expertise, experience, and robust – yet agile – planning process meant that things ran smoothly and the job was delivered on time.”
The Ross Hall Hospital project is just one example of the work we do within the health care and medical sector. We work with both private healthcare providers and the NHS (we’re a trusted supplier for NHS Scotland and have also delivered projects for NHS Trusts across the UK). We’ve worked on a wide range of projects, from healthcare hubs to testing labs – and everything in between. As the success of the Ross Hall project demonstrates, we can transform a tired and rundown site into a new, state of the art space, that meets the needs of all users. And at the other end of the scale, we can provide simple, routine maintenance, to ensure that sites are kept safe and functional.