Today’s move of patients into the Royal Hobart Hospital’s J-Block general medicine unit is a significant milestone in the $689 million redevelopment of the state’s major hospital.
The Hodgman Liberal Government has been committed to developing a state-of-the-art health facility for all Tasmanians since we came to office and we are delivering on that promise.
The new two-storey J-Block (formerly referred to as the temporary inpatient facility) is a critical feature of the decanting plan to allow B-Block to be demolished and the new 10-storey K-Block inpatient precinct to be built providing capacity for 250 additional beds.
The first patients moved into the 22-bed general medicine unit this morning and to ensure there is no reduction in beds, five additional beds were opened on ward 6A to complement this ward.
General medicine provides treatment for medical conditions such as respiratory illness, infections and cardiac conditions.
This is just one part of the decanting plan – we have already seen significant upgrades across a wide range of areas, including cancer care, ambulatory care, renal dialysis and surgical specialities.
Mental health inpatients are scheduled to relocate on November 29.
The RHH Redevelopment is a major investment in providing better health care for all Tasmanians and the Hodgman Government will do everything we can to complete this project.
Obviously, there will be some unavoidable disruption during the building process and I ask people to be patient through this process because at the end of the day, this will provide all Tasmanians with the new, state-of-the-art hospital they deserve.
Tasmanians can also be assured patient safety is paramount and nothing will be done which compromises patient safety during the building process.
