From Friday 3rd April 2020 the Halton Hospital site will be temporarily reconfigured in response to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. This is in order to redeploy skilled staff to support the expected increased demand to treat patients affected by COVID-19.
From Friday, patients, visitors and staff will be required to enter only through the Phase 2 entrance (Urgent Care Centre end) and arrangements have been made for the shuttle bus to pick up and drop off only from this entrance. Phase 1 entrance will not be operational.
The following services at Halton General are all accessible from the Phase 2 entrance: Urgent Care Centre (8am-7pm 7days/week), wards B1 & B3 and Pharmacy. The Planned Investigations Unit PIU and phlebotomy are now co-located as are ECG and pre-op at the former B2. The George Lloyd restaurant remains open for takeaways only and the Brooker Centre and Renal Dialysis unit are unaffected by this change. CT scans will continue to be delivered from CMTC’s ground floor to support Urgent Care Centre patients.
Already, non-emergency outpatient appointments have been postponed or converted to telephone consultations and therapies have been relocated to Warrington, other nearby centres or postponed if not urgent. Chemotherapy services are being delivered for the immediate future at Clatterbridge on the Wirral and the Delamere Centre will correspondingly recommence its support services in due course.
Professor Simon Constable, Chief Executive said: “We are very fortunate to have Halton as a stand-alone home for our planned (elective) work. This gives us immediate access to Halton’s highly skilled theatre and other staff that we are now re-allocating to increase our critical care and emergency capacity as part of our COVID-19 effort.
“Already we are working with partners to explore the possibility of using the Halton campus for patients recovering and rehabilitating from acute illness following treatment at any of our local hospitals, not just COVID-19 patients.
“This is an evolving situation and we are continuing to change and adapt to meet the needs of our patients as new guidance is issued. Meanwhile, our commitment to the growth and development of the Halton site remains our plan for the future - when we emerge the other side of this - which we will.”