The Princess of Wales Hospital in Ely will be opening a new £13m Community Diagnostic Centre next year as the site transitions into offering more community-based healthcare services.
These new facilities aim to speed up the diagnosis of conditions like cancer and cardiovascular disease, and will save patients travelling further afield to Cambridge.
The centre will also have modern imaging equipment such as CT, MRI, X-Ray and ultrasound as well as cardio-respiratory and blood tests.
Mobile equipment will arrive towards the end of the year for diagnostic services to commence before the dedicated facilities officially open.
Lucy Frazer, the MP for South East Cambridgeshire, says £13m is being invested into Ely’s Community Diagnostic Centre.
The Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Integrated Care System works with organisations to plan and deliver health and care services across the county.
Its spokesperson said: “We are committed to bringing healthcare services closer to the community, so that people can get the care they need locally.
“The new Community Diagnostic Centre at Princess of Wales Hospital in Ely will play a vital part in this when it opens in the new year.
“The Centre will provide more local access to tests and scans – helping to reduce waiting times and ensure people to get seen faster, closer to home.”
So far, it has carried out 4,000 CT and MRI scans.
Both centres are managed by Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, the trust which also runs Addenbrooke’s Hospital.
It is estimated that the two new centres in Cambridgeshire will deliver an extra 120,000 checks, scans and test appointments in their first year.
The drive is part of a £2.6bn government pledge to establish 160 Community Diagnostic Centres nationally by March 2025 and alleviate demand on hospitals after the pandemic.
Planning documents say there is pressure to have the Ely diagnostic centre open by October 2024.
In June 2021, outline planning permission was granted for the Princess of Wales Hospital to better accommodate “modern community-based care pathways”.
Those outline plans included replacing out-of-date facilities from when it was a 1940s Royal Air Force Hospital, with a modern three-storey building connected to the day surgery unit.
This would house services such as an urgent care centre, GP surgeries, dentistry, the pharmacy and other community-based therapies.
“Our county has been, and will be, one of the fastest growing regions in the UK and I have made it clear that additional quality services must be introduced if we are to keep meeting patients’ health needs with excellence.
“I am encouraged that my calls and those of others have been answered, first with the St Mary’s surgery expansion with support from East Cambridgeshire District Council and now with the new CDC; helped by the record government funding made available for the NHS this year.
“Looking ahead, I continue to campaign for the capital funding required to further expand the Princess of Wales so that it can offer even more services, such as an expanded day surgery unit, urgent treatment centre, and primary care unit.”
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here