Healthcare
"NHS trusts have been tasked by the Government to upgrade their facilities to meet new service expectations, but must deliver within tight financial constraints" Colin Gush, Sector Director, Construction
The past year has seen Osborne undertaking some substantial projects in the healthcare sector under a variety of different procurement mechanisms.
During the year we completed the country’s largest Acute Admissions Unit for West Hertfordshire Hospitals NHS Trust through ProCure21. The three-storey, 120 bed facility is the largest modular building constructed for the NHS and was delivered in less than a year from the signing of the contract.
Two new facilities for the Hertfordshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust are on site at Harperbury Hospital. We were initially appointed under ProCure21 to build a £9 million Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit. Once this contract was underway, the client then appointed us to construct a Child and Adolescent Mental Health facility, using a combination of new build and refurbishment of existing buildings.
Our ProCure21 activities are carried out through our role as a founding shareholder in Medicinq, one of eight supply chain partners in England to have been awarded contracts under ProCure21. Medicinq works differently from the other consortia on the framework in that it is a consortium of three regional construction companies that together provide national coverage, but with each firm offering local delivery. Our shared values include a commitment to openness, partnership working and continuous improvement. The Medicinq partners also share best practice, and have brought together clients from across the country to learn from each other and from the designers and suppliers in our supply chain.
ProCure21 gives us the opportunity to get involved with clients at an early stage in the planning of projects, enabling us to contribute more than just our construction skills. We can use our supply chain, which includes health planners and architects, to deliver a construction scheme as part of a wider solution to clients’ requirements. For example, by looking at the existing space or bringing together services that currently sit on different sites.
Other ProCure21 projects carried out in the past year include a £4.2 million project to redevelop the Royal South Hants Hospital in Southampton. The scheme involved building a new main entrance, reconfiguring the existing site, and refurbishing an existing ward. Working in a live hospital environment presented considerable challenges which meant that planning and sequencing was a critical success factor.
At the same site, we are constructing a new £20 million Adult Mental Health Unit, procured as part of the South West Hampshire LIFT (Local Improvement Finance Trust), which is owned by Southampton City and Hampshire Primary Care Trusts, Community Health Partnerships and gbprimarycare, in which Osborne is a shareholder. We are also building a £10 million Primary Care Delivery Centre at the Western Community Hospital for the LIFT.
During 2008 a number of important projects, integral to the regeneration and redevelopment of the Royal South Hants Hospital campus were delivered by Osborne. These were achieved without any major disruption or impact on patients and the public at a time when new clinical services were being established. Important timescales were also met including the completion of the new main entrance at the same time as the opening of the new treatment centre and the completion of important improvements to the older people’s rehabilitation wards. Throughout, the joint working and the co-ordination between the contractor and the PCT was excellent. Lynne Kendall, Portfolio Manager, Estate Development, NHS Southampton City, Southampton City Primary Care Trust
For more information contact construction@osborne.co.uk