We are continually striving to improve the services we offer to patients. Details of our new developments, including building projects and new services are available here.
New Acute Medical Unit at Tunbridge Wells Hospital
A new acute medical unit has opened (March 2016) at Tunbridge Wells Hospital to improve emergency patient flow through the Trust and enhance standards of care for patients.
Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust has invested £3.3 million in the facility, which forms part of the Trust’s ongoing planned response to increases in demand for emergency care.
The 38-bed ward is made up of two single rooms and nine 4-bed bays, and will act as a central hub for handling A&E patients and receiving urgent GP medical referrals.
There are three main functions for the Acute Medical Unit (AMU):
- an ambulatory care area, allowing us to provide day care treatment
- a rapid assessment area, enabling GPs to admit directly to the unit, avoiding A&E
- a short stay area for emergency patients
Patients will stay for no longer than 48 hours, before being discharged or admitted to another ward within the hospital. By having these three areas contained in one ward, medical and nursing staff will be able to work more efficiently.
More information is available here.
New respiratory ward opens at Maidstone Hospital
A newly refurbished 31-bed respiratory ward opened at Maidstone Hospital on Monday 30 November at a cost of £3 million.
John Day ward has been re-modelled and modernised to create a much-improved and impressive environment for our patients. It includes an enhanced care bay for patients requiring more intensive monitoring or intervention, and a negative pressure room for patients with airborne transmitted diseases such as Tuberculosis, who require isolation.
The improved ward layout has five 4-bed bays and one 3-bed bay, all with shower rooms and toilet facilities. There are also seven single rooms with en-suite facilities and an additional single room with negative pressure facilities for patients who require isolation with respiratory problems such as tuberculosis.
This ward refurbishment is part of ongoing work and development to improve wards and other areas throughout Maidstone Hospital.
You can read more about the new ward here.
State of the art radiotherapy equipment for Kent Oncology Centre
Cancer patients with`moving’ tumours will be treated with ever greater accuracy thanks to a super smart radiotherapy machine that can track and target cancers by making ten thousand calculations a second.
On Monday 23 November, Kent Oncology Centre at Canterbury, which is part of Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust, officially opened the first radiotherapy machine in the county to have the very latest state-of-the-art “Truebeam” treatment technology installed.
This £2million technology will help to more quickly and accurately treat certain types of cancers which can be relatively mobile within a patient’s body.
Read more about the equipment here.
New phlebotomy room opens at Maidstone Hospital
A new phlebotomy room has opened (April 2016) in the Outpatients department (OPD) at Maidstone Hospital in April.
The room is called Phlebotomy Blood Tests and is on the right hand side of the corridor which leads into the OPD on the ground floor.
This new facility has been designed to provide a more comfortable environment for patients who are waiting for, and having, blood tests. It has three private rooms, with improved access for wheelchairs, and a pleasant seated area for patients waiting to be called.
The vacuum transport system has been moved into this area too, which allows blood tests to be transported rapidly to the laboratory.