A €100 MILLION investment by the Republic’s largest private health service operator in two of its hospitals will see building work commence shortly. One of the facilities is expected to be commissioned and operational by 2011 and the other by late 2012 or early 2013.
The Bons Secours Health System is to invest €85 million in its Cork hospital on College Road in Glasheen while it is to spend a further €15 million on its Galway hospital on the Dublin Road in Renmore following planning permission for both projects.
The Cork hospital’s expansion will involve the building of a new five-storey wing offering 26,000sq m of space for 80 additional rooms, three new theatres (including two for orthopaedic procedures) and a new cancer centre with radiotherapy and a PET/CT scanner.
The expansion, which has been cleared for planning permission following an appeal by some local residents to An Bord Pleanála, will also involve additional day ward and inpatient facilities as well as a multi-storey car park with spaces for 399 cars located to the north of the hospital.
The creation of an extra 80 private beds in the new wing will increase total bed capacity to 420 at the College Road hospital which was established by the Bons Secours order in 1915.
The hospital currently has more than 18,000 admissions and some 29,000 outpatients annually.
According to a Bons Secours Health Service spokeswoman, a detail design process is due to commence shortly.
Construction work is expected to begin early in 2010 with a projected construction time of 18-24 months leading to commissioning late in 2012/2013, she said.
Meanwhile, a planned €15 million investment in the Galway hospital is more advanced with contracts signed with builder JJ Rhatigan for the building of a three-storey extension at the front of the existing building.
The construction of the extension is expected to be finished by the middle of 2011.
The development, which will incorporate 50 new bedrooms, a new physiotherapy department and dining room, represents phase two of an overall investment of €50 million in the Galway hospital, which the Bons Secours acquired in 1999.
The hospital, which currently has 90 acute beds and will treat some 19,000 patients this year, underwent a significant expansion in 2006 with the creation of four operating theatres, two endoscopy rooms, a 22-bed day ward and a new radiology department.
Pat Lyons, group chief executive of Bon Secours Health System, said the combined €100 million investment was in response to the growing demand from consultants, general practitioners and patients for additional facilities and services at both hospitals.
“We are fully committed to a strategy which focuses on sustaining our business model and, indeed, protecting employment in the midst of an extremely challenging economic cycle,” said Mr Lyons.