August 11 2023

Finalised plans for a replacement Monklands Hospital have been published by way of a formal planning application by Keppie Design on behalf of NHS Lanarkshire.

At 40 years old University Hospital Monklands has reached the end of its usable life, prompting a migration to a 125ha green belt site at Wester Moffat Farm in Airdrie.

Taking the opportunity to embrace forward-looking care models the new approach will co-locate ambulatory care services on a single floor, significantly increasing the ground floor footprint. This will have the added benefit of increasing departmental adjacencies and improving patient circulation.

The reorganisation will group acutely ill patients on a 'hot floor' above, consolidating care within a separate unit. Embracing the 'peri-operative' model of patient care that shrinks the patient journey to a single room for pre and post-surgery care rather than shuttling between spaces. A requirement for all new build inpatient ward accommodation to comprise single bedrooms has guided the use of an 'interlocking ensuite' model for radial accommodation blocks, based on extrapolated patient numbers to 2027.

In their design statement, Keppie wrote: "The new clinical model results in a very large ground floor so that all of the departments from emergency medicine right the way through to radiology, cancer care and renal services are all close to each other giving the best patient experience.

"Because of the scale, it was felt appropriate to consider the split of such a potentially large building down into separate areas or districts, each with its own identity and human scale, but unified as part of the ‘town’ plan. As with any successful town or village plan, hierarchy and a sense of place are reinforced by an interrelated series of streets and squares, which occur along patterns of established movement."

Green spaces reach deep into the plan to maximise daylight, focussed upon a primary pedestrian street.  

3 Comments

#1 Posted by Riddy on 12 Aug 2023 at 09:19 AM

Industrial Estate

#2 Posted by GeorgeNTravels on 12 Aug 2023 at 19:30 PM

Will probably be as much a shambles as QEUH. Interlocking toilets?

#3 Posted by Don't Fear the Reaper on 14 Aug 2023 at 17:29 PM

Roll up, roll up... to Keppie's Industrial Death Factory.

A design that's as grim as the Reaper himself!

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