Construction is due to start this month of a new hospital that the co-funders say will provide Kent’s only cardiothoracic and neurosurgery tertiary care beds. The Kent Institute of Medicine and Surgery (KIMS) is to be built on a seven-acre site close to the M20 near Maidstone, and has been five years in planning.
Clydesdale Bank will provide £34 million of funding; covering the initial build and operational costs, with additional funding for the £80 m scheme coming from corporate and private investors, including 100 clinicians, who are providing cash and personal guarantees. KIMS will be part-owned and run by clinicians; Clydesdale says this will ‘put patient welfare to the fore’.
The new facility, is expected to be completed in early 2014, and will provide 74 inpatient beds, and care across multiple disciplines, including cardiothoracic, neurosurgery, gynaecology, orthopaedics, oncology, and diagnostics – including angiography, advanced MRI, and nuclear medicine.
The longer term ‘vision’ is to extend the site, creating a medical campus that will be a ‘centre of excellence’. KIMS will utilise the services of around 200 clinicians, including ‘leading names’ from a number of medical disciplines, with the hospital expected also to create around 400 new jobs. The facility will provide private medical care, plus support for the NHS by providing treatments to Kent residents for which they currently have to travel to London hospitals. Up to 25% of capacity will be available for NHS treatments. Clydesdale says Kent PCTs currently spend around £250 m annually sending patients to London hospitals
The new hospital will incorporate nine theatres for both simple and complex procedures, incorporating video facilities, and enabling teaching and instruction anywhere in the world. It will also ‘benefit from the latest medical technology’, thanks to an agreement with GE Healthcare.
As part of the funding agreement, Clydesdale Bank has also secured naming rights to the hospital’s education building for 15 years.
The hospital is to be built by Vinci UK, with the project development and planning consultants being DHA Planning, and the architects, David Morley Architects.
