LOOK: Inside New Alder Hey
As Alder Hey's £237m new building prepares to open its doors tomorrow, we've been for a sneak peek inside.
The move has been years in the planning, with construction starting two years ago.
As one of Europe’s biggest and busiest children’s hospitals, Alder Hey treats around 275,000 patients each year. The new ‘Alder Hey in the Park’ will feature a uniquely designed hospital alongside a dedicated children’s research and innovation facility, creating a leading-edge centre for children’s healthcare and research.
Inspired by children and young people, the new Alder Hey in the Park will provide a world class healing environment for thousands of patients from across the UK. It will have 270 beds, including 48 critical care beds for patients in Intensive Care, High Dependency and Burns, together with 16 digitally enhanced operating theatres. The majority of children and their families will have their own room with en-suite facilities and park views from their bedroom window; while each ward will have its own kitchen providing patients with freshly cooked food to order.
Alongside the new hospital, Alder Hey has also built an innovative Research and Education Centre. The new facility will place Alder Hey and Liverpool as a national and international leader in the development of safer and more effective medicines for children and young people. The new facility will allow researchers and clinicians to work with industry to develop safer, better medicines and therapies for children to use in the NHS and throughout the world.
Louise Shepherd, Chief Executive of Alder Hey said: “From the beginning we have strived to create a world-class healing environment that will benefit children and young people from across the UK and throughout the world. Our new ‘Alder Hey in the Park’ has been designed to meet the expectations of patients who wanted to be looked after in a state of the art facility that was fun, helped them recover quickly and most importantly didn’t look like a hospital. This was a once in a life time opportunity to create something really special for our patients, families and staff; a dedicated healthcare facility providing the very best treatment and care to thousands of children and young people.”
Children and young people have been involved in designing the new hospital since an initial consultation back in 2009, where almost 1000 patients drew pictures and shared their views on what their new hospital should look like. Made up of current and former patients aged 10-22, the Children and Young People’s Design Group have had their say throughout the design process on everything from the colour of the rooms, to the artwork displayed in the new hospital and what their wards should look like.
Radio City's News' Adam Phillips has this report from the new Alder Hey