The City of London’s first independent hospital has opened its doors, providing a cardiac care pathway for private patients as well as specialising in cancer care, orthopaedics, and women’s healthcare.
The £70m Nuffield Health at St Bartholomew’s Hospital has been built in collaboration with Barts Health NHS Trust, which runs St Bartholomew’s Hospital, and it will share consultants, with any surpluses generated from private activity invested back into NHS services.
Located within the grounds of St Bartholomew’s Hospital site, a leading specialist heart and cancer centre in Europe, the 55-bed facility is split over two buildings and is supported by seven intensive care beds and by a wide range of diagnostic and physiotherapy services, including 26 consultation rooms.
It is part of a new health and wellbeing campus, meaning patients will also have access to the recently-opened Nuffield Health Fitness & Wellbeing Centre in Barbican, providing prehabilitation and rehabilitation support as well as mental wellbeing services.
In addition, Nuffield Health will run free-to-access community clinics from the campus, including joint pain and COVID-19 rehabilitation programmes.
Uniquely in the independent sector, the new hospital’s cardiac care pathway includes cardiac rehabilitation.
Patients will be assigned one physiotherapist and one clinical nurse specialist to support them from diagnosis, through treatment, and then onto rehabilitation.
Any profits from the new facility, which is situated in the grounds of St Bartholomew's Hospital, will be invested into the NHS
Consultants will benefit from the breadth of experts working at the new hospital, with operating theatres featuring in-built live streaming capabilities.
The hospital is operationally independent, with Nuffield Health leasing and renovating the former pathology and residential staff quarters buildings.
Jonathan Canham, business development director and interim hospital director at the hospital, said: “We are delighted to open the doors to our new hospital, the first and only independent hospital in the City of London community.
“Our new hospital complements the internationally-leading cardiac care delivered at the neighbouring St Bartholomew’s Hospital and our private patients will have access to many leading consultants within cardiac, cancer, orthopaedics, and women’s healthcare.”
Dame Alwen Williams, Barts Health NHS Trust group chief executive, added: “Our partnership with Nuffield Health has breathed new life into our historic buildings, while surpluses generated from private patient activity will be invested back into NHS services, benefiting patients across east London.”
The hospital features a full range of diagnostic services including an imaging suite and Siemens MAGNETOM Sola 1.5T MRI system with BioMatrix Technology, which means the scanner automatically adjusts for each patient to give greater precision and better diagnosis.