New Shrewsbury cancer centre is ready for action
Shrewsbury's new £5 million cancer centre will help medical staff provide 'excellent care' to the thousands of Shropshire patients it looks after each year, hospital bosses have said.
The Lingen Davies Centre officially opened on Monday, with the building including a new reception, an outpatient unit for haematology, head and neck, and oncology patients as well as the chemotherapy day unit.
Sarah Faulkner, the trust's centre manager for the oncology centre, said the new facilities are a massive improvement on what was previously available to staff and patients.
She said: "There are still a few finishing touches to come, like the televisions in the reception area, but other than that we are just about done.
"People – patients and staff – are really relieved to get into the new centre. There's no comparison to what we had in Clinic 9 (where the old Haematology Day Unit was based) to what we have now.
"We have all strived to provide excellent care for our patients and now we've got the facilities to back it up. All the feedback we have received from patients who have used it today has been very positive."
More than £3.5m was donated to the charity to help build the centre.
The charity also fronted a campaign to raise more than £350,000 for vital equipment and to provide en-suite facilities for head and neck cancer patients at PRH.
A further crucial injection of cash came from the Shropshire Blood Trust Fund, which provided more than £1m, while head and neck charities raised £250,000 and the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital's League of Friends came up with £300,000.
Louise Cliffe, acting fundraising manager for Lingen Davies, said: "The continued generosity of the local community, over the last eight years, has enabled this centre to be built, and it will make a huge difference to cancer patients."
