Inside the £988m Midland Metropolitan Hospital set to open in October

The 80,000sqm building combines two A&E departments into one replacing the departments at Sandwell General Hospital and City Hospital. Credit: ITV News Central

The Midland Metropolitan University Hospital, which is set to open on October 6, will provide healthcare for people in the Black Country and Birmingham.

The hospital, located in Smethwick, will replace Sandwell General Hospital and City Hospital A&E departments and will be run by four and a half thousand NHS staff.

The hospital was supposed to open in 2018, but the collapse of Wolverhampton based construction company Carillion and then coronavirus - brought delay after delay.

Nursing staff are convinced they’ll be able to spend more time at a patients side.

One nurse said: "We have isolation rooms which means that I can talk to the patient on the intercom, see what they require, get what they need, and then put protective gear on and then go into the patient, so we are not wasting time put our protective gear on and off a number of times."

The cost wound up being - more than double the original estimate - reaching over 988m pounds while the new hospitals capacity - is actually smaller than the two its replacing.

Lewis Warner asked the Chief Executive of the trust if this was a mistake:

Chief Executive of the trust, Richard Beeken said: "The business case was written ten years ago and demand has changed since then. We are the only trusted within Birmingham and the black country who's hospital admission is going down, not up."

The ambulance service is hoping it can begin to avoid long handover delays.

Facilities at Midland Metropolitan University Hospital

Facilities include

  • A purpose-built A&E (Emergency Department) with imaging and diagnostic services

  • A dedicated children’s A&E (Emergency Department) and assessment unit

  • Separate adult and children’s wards with 50 per cent of beds being within single ensuite rooms

  • Operating theatres for both emergency, major planned surgery and maternity

  • A midwife-led birthing unit next to a delivery suite, two maternity wards and antenatal services

  • A neonatal unit

  • Same day emergency care for adults

  • Sickle cell and thalassaemia centre

  • More than 700 beds & 11 operating theatres

  • A Winter Garden and outdoor spaces designed to help patients stay active

  • Greggs, Marks & Spencer aswell as an Amazon Market Express.

  • The Winter Garden on level 5 will host the restaurant

  • Numerous coffee shops available across the hospital site