The brand new North Tower at Lismore Base Hospital is nearly ready to become operational and will be open by the early April 2020.

The freshly painted new tower now joins seamlessly with the existing hospital tower, which will be the subject of refurbishment in the future.

North Tower, to be known as F Block, will include two inpatient wards (one medical and one surgical), an Intensive Care Unit (ICU), pharmacy, imaging, day surgery and endoscopy units, hospital administration facilities, security office, and admissions department.

Patient recovery areas inside the new hospital tower.

Yesterday, the building was open for inspection and Parliamentary Secretary for Health, the Hon Natasha Maclaren-Jones MLC inspected the eight-storey building, ahead of it being handed over to the Northern NSW Local Health District.

The new tower has been completed ahead of schedule, marking a major milestone in the $322 million Stage 3 redevelopment project for the local hospital.

Ms Maclaren-Jones said the early hand-over gives hospital management and staff greater opportunity to familiarise themselves with the new building and carry out the necessary preparations before it opens to the public via a staged process.

“The construction company John Holland and Health Infrastructure have done a fantastic job completing the project two months ahead of schedule,” Mrs Maclaren-Jones said.

Brand new operating theatres and hospital rooms are getting finishing touches.

Construction of the North Tower commenced in May 2018, with an average of 115 people working on the site each day, generating 745 jobs on site.

Northern NSW Local Health District (NNSWLHD) board chair Brian Pezzutti is excited that the building is almost ready for operation. 

He’s been overseeing the project and said the new operating theatres had state of the art equipment and were different to what we’ve seen before.

“Now we have two endoscopy theatres and the theatres are hybrid theatres where patients can receive a number of procedures in one place,” he said.

“Having these new services available will bring more medical specialists into our regional area to work.

“It will be a magnet for people looking for the opportunity to live in a rural area with the regional lifestyle – it will provide work opportunities usually only found in metropolitan areas.

Mr Pezzutti said the inclusion of the intensive care and surgical ward was the result of former local politician Thomas George.

“He fought hard to get the extra $50 million extra on top to get it done,” he said. “It would be great if we could name something after him.”

NNSWLHD chief executive Wayne Jones said having the new expanded services mean that local people will have access to new services.

“we will see a significant reduction in the numbers of people who have to leave the area to go to a major city for surgery,” he said.

With 90 new beds for patients, the times spent in hospital for surgery are expected to reduce, with more surgeries complete and patients going home within one day.

“The rooms are more spread out, the operating theatre is bigger and the new surgical ward is a contemporary state of the art design,” he said.

Between May 2018 and September 2019, 745 workers were employed on the construction of the new tower, including 61 apprentices, 162 workers who participated in structured training or upskilling, 17 Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander workers, and 19 women working in trade roles.

Once the tower opens next year, there will eb a recruitment of people for more new jobs in a number of areas, from cleaning to administration.

The $322 million redevelopment project is scheduled to be completed at the end of 2021.

The NSW Government has invested more than $10 billion since 2011 to build, upgrade and redevelop hospitals and health facilities across NSW. 

An additional $10.1 billion is being invested over the next four years to continue current projects and start upgrading or building a further 29 hospitals and health facilities.