Practice Plus Group Hospital, Emersons Green has collaborated with North Bristol NHS Trust (NBT) to support the NHS and ensure urgent cancer surgeries will go ahead despite lockdown.
Breast, urological and skin cancer surgery will be carried out at the hospital, as well as urgent general surgery.
During the first period of lockdown, the team at Emersons Green worked with specialists from the Bristol Breast Care Centre (BBCC) to support the delivery of urgent cancer care in a safe, coronavirus-free environment.
From 8 February 2021, patients started to be treated at Emersons Green Hospital for bladder cancer and general surgery. The hospital will continue to undertake breast cancer surgery on NBT patients.
Hospital director Chester Barnes explained:
“Our teams took on additional training to support NBT’s specialists as they operated in our theatres. It was a great success and we were all delighted to offer to extend our support to such a crucial service.
“As the country moved into national lockdown in January we were delighted to be able to offer our support again. This time our ward team have undergone ‘Essentials in Urology’ training from NBT as a precursor to taking on this activity.”
Karen Brown, chief operating officer at NBT, said: “We are pleased to be working again with our colleagues at Emersons Green to deliver surgery for our patients.
“Collaboration with Emersons Green Hospital during the first wave of the pandemic enabled us to continue to operate on breast cancer patients and improve their health outcomes through 2020.
“By strengthening this partnership we will be increasing our capacity to deliver elective operations, some of which have been delayed by the second wave, and continue to focus on delivering urgent cancer surgeries”.
NBT patients will be informed by the Trust as to where their appointments will be held.
Chester said:
“I would like to reassure all patients coming to Emersons Green Hospital that we have invested in convenient onsite coronavirus testing and we have a drive-in swab station which, together with a well-marked one way-system within the hospital, has enabled us to provide a COVID-secure pathway.”