AMBITIONS AND PLANS

Our patients are the most important thing to us and we’re constantly striving to improve the care they receive.

We aim to ensure that our staff are highly trained and encourage research, which allows us to offer our patients the latest technologies, techniques and medicines, while also helping to attract and retain our enviable team of more than 15,000 highly skilled staff.

It is an exciting time at Leicester’s Hospitals. This summer, colleagues completed the biggest programme of service moves in the Trust’s history – marking the beginning of a project that forms part of our wider plans to continue improving our services and hospitals for our patients and workforce.

Our critical care colleagues are now in their new homes on modern wards. Our adult ICUs have been expanded to accommodate 52 beds and Renal Transplant, HPB and major Urology services have all moved to new facilities.

But it’s not just our buildings we are proud of. We are proud to be working with partners to improve outcomes, tackle inequalities, enhance productivity and support broader social and economic development.

Most importantly, we are proud of our colleagues’ care and compassion and the difference they make every day. I hope in time, you’ll join us on our journey and see for yourself why UHL is a great place to work and receive care.

Andrew Furlong
Medical Director, Deputy Chief Executive, Paediatric Orthopaedic Surgeon

Leicester’s Reconfiguration Programme

UHL is unique in that it has 3 acute hospitals in a 7-mile radius. The Reconfiguration Programme underpins the ICS to help enable the health economy to deliver sustainable and clinically effective services for the future. The Programme supports UHL to move all acute care onto the Leicester Royal Infirmary (LRI) and Glenfield Hospital (GH); whilst repurposing the LGH to support some planned care.

Over the past ten years, the enhancement of the two acute sites has been incrementally progressed. This has included:

  • Development of a new Emergency Floor (new ED and assessment units) at the LRI to improve effective flow of our emergency and acute patients 
  • The move of vascular services from the LRI to GH to strengthen the clinical adjacencies for cardio-vascular patients
  • The move of the East Midlands Congenital Heart Centre from the GH to the LRI to be co=located with other Children’s Services
  • The move of level 3 ICU beds off the LGH site to the LRI and GH; which included the move of emergency surgery from the LGH to the LRI, and the move of hepatobiliary, renal and transplant services from the LGH to the GH

We were allocated £450m by the Government in September 2019, to realise the programme to reconfigure Leicester’s Hospitals. These proposals were supported through a process of public consultation, which concluded at the end of 2020.  The allocation enables us to create:

  • A new Maternity Hospital at the Leicester Royal Infirmary
  • A dedicated Children’s Hospital at the Leicester Royal Infirmary
  • An extension to the Glenfield Hospital, incorporating a Treatment Centre, theatres and wards, all supporting planned care
  • Two ‘super’ intensive care units at the LRI and GH

The Leicester General Hospital will be a smaller campus which will have some non-acute services on site, to include:

  • Diabetes Centre of Excellence
  • Imaging facilities and Community Diagnostic Hub
  • Stroke recovery services with inpatient beds (operated by Leicestershire Partnership Trust)
  • Midwifery Led Unit (re-located from St Mary’s in Melton Mowbray)

Our latest exciting development is the East Midlands Elective Care Centre on the LGH site, providing day case theatres, recovery and a 23-hour ward, non-surgical day case, and out-patient/clean room facilities. the first phase will open in Spring 2023 to support day case work out of 1 theatre, the whole centre will be ready Autumn 2024.

The programme sits within the NHS England ‘New Hospital Programme’ (NHP), created to manage the delivery of the Government’s commitment to build 40 new hospitals by 2030. The New Hospital Programme team are developing a standardised approach to delivering new hospitals nationally. This has culminated in a case for additional funding, which is awaiting Treasury approval.  Confirmation of funding allocation to deliver the UHL programme to meet the standardisation is expected in spring 2023.  

The first step in the programme is the enabling works on the LRI site; required to clear the Victorian Knighton Street Campus in preparation for the intended New Build at Leicester Royal Infirmary. The case for this will be progressed in 2023/24.