£3M Revamp Plans For Leicestershire Mental Health Hospitals

Mental health hospitals in Leicestershire are set to receive a £3 million revamp, it emerged today.

Plans include creating women-only accommodation and an overhaul of another ward at two units on the Glenfield Hospital site.

The Department of Health has agreed to provide funding for the project, which is due to get under way in April and will take about a year to complete.

The money is part of national pot of £30 million for improvements in patient privacy, dignity and safety for women on adult mental health wards. Bosses at the Leicester Partnership Trust, responsible for mental health services across the county, say the upgrade will mean better and safer in-patient care. But they add it is an interim measure while plans for new accommodation on one site are discussed.

The trust’s health watchdog – the patient and public involvement forum – said it was delighted with the plans.

But members are concerned about patients needing to be admitted before work is complete.

About £2 million will be used to upgrade a ward and provide single en-suite accommodation at the city’s Bradgate unit. A further £750,000 will provide a new three-bed wing specifically for women at the Belvoir unit. Two wards are currently empty at the Bradgate unit as part of cost-cutting measures by the trust.

The Bosworth ward was shut this year and patients from Fosse ward were moved to beds at the Brandon unit, at Leicester General Hospital.

Christine Palmer, associate director of communications at the trust, said the two vacant wards were giving the flexibility to carry out the upgrade.