Hospital unit wins accolade

Hawke's Bay District Health Board facilities contractor Julie Collingwood and project manager Trent Fairey are part of the team that picked up a prestigious award for the mental health inpatient building at Hawke's Bay Hospital. Photo / Warren Buckland

The biggest investment at Hawke's Bay Hospital since the amalgamation of Napier and Hastings hospitals in 1991 has picked up a prestigious property development award.

The $22 million mental health inpatient unit, Nga Rau Rakau, has won an Award of Merit for the Fagerhult NZ Health and Medical Property Award, part of the recent New Zealand Rider Levett Bucknall Property Industry Awards.

The awards are judged on innovation, economic factors, design, engineering, construction, user satisfaction, sustainability and efficiency.

The hospital unit, which has 23 beds and a gym, was co-designed with a patient advisory group.

Project manager Trent Fairey said it was "quite a long journey", taking a year-and-a-half for design and a year-and-a-half for construction.

The building was an integral part of a "massive" change for the Hawke's Bay District Health Board's model of care.

"Facilities try to just get on with it and nurses and doctors usually receive the attention - we are just in the background - so it is quite nice for the team to get some recognition."

At the official opening, Health Minister Jonathan Coleman said he worked at the former unit for four weeks during his sixth year of medical school.

"I have a very clear memory from one night, at the front of the unit, having a discussion with a patient who was certainly extending the very limit of my professional skills."

Due to the layout of the old building, no one came to his aid. "I wondered where everyone else was, but of course no one could see me."

He said Nga Rau Rakau was world class because of service changes and the new building.

Alexander Construction was the main contractor of the Fitness Fleming Architects design.

But facilities are not resting on their laurels. Their current project is a new endoscopy building, part of the Government's bowel screening programme.

Construction is due to start January on a green space near the hospital's main entrance.

Expressions of interest in the project would soon be advertised.