The final phase of the West Kent Community Diagnostic Centre (CDC) at Hermitage Court close to Maidstone Hospital in Kent opened its doors to patients on 10 March.
The Hounsfield Unit, which houses CT, MRI, and phlebotomy services, has been named after Godfrey Hounsfield, a British electrical engineer who was awarded a Nobel Prize for his part in developing the CT scan. The new unit’s first patient was welcomed for a CT scan on the new scanner. Work on the CDC started with the arrival of mobile scanners in 2021, followed by the opening of the first building, Unit A, in 2023. The unit, which offers ultrasound, X-ray, respiratory, and cardiology tests, was officially opened by then-Secretary of State, Victoria Atkins MP, and has so far delivered 80,000 diagnostic tests. The Hounsfield Unit will significantly increase these numbers, with a further 78,000 tests forecast to take place there annually.
Jelena Pochin, Divisional director of Operations for Core Clinical Services and General Manager for Radiology, said: “The West Kent Community Diagnostic Centre has been years in the making, and to see the project complete – and to such a high standard – is wonderful. The majority of patients we see at MTW require at least one diagnostic test, and the CDC provides extra capacity to ensure that patients receive these tests as quickly as possible. I’d like to thank all the teams and colleagues involved, with special thanks to Steve Hockney, who has overseen the CDC project right from the start, and whose commitment and perseverance have been crucial to its success.”
The photo shows representatives from the Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust’s Core Clinical Services and Radiology teams with project partners Canon Medical Systems, Western Building Systems, Gardiner & Theobald, and Gallagher Property, at the new building on the day it opened.
