Ultrasound facility opens at CDC
Date of release: 10 October 2024
A new Ultrasound facility has opened in Cannock as part of a £15m development to improve patient waiting times – accommodating more than 500 appointments per week.
New Ultrasound facility at Cannock Chase Hospital
Four new Ultrasound (US) rooms are now ‘live’ at the Community Diagnostic Centre (CDC) at Cannock Chase Hospital (CCH).
They form phase two of the CDC, the purpose-built-modular building which hosts four state-of-the-art scanners – two CT and two MRI – costing around £1m each. The CDC also contains endoscopy and other physiological services.
The new Ultrasound rooms will contribute to further improvements in waiting times for patients from Cannock, other parts of South Staffordshire and Wolverhampton.
The US leadership team of Karen Hill, Superintendent Sonographer, Tash Smith, Deputy Superintendent of Diagnostic Radiography, and Sarah Davies, Imaging Assistant Team Leader, has ensured the opening has gone smoothly.
“The team is really pleased with the new department. It’s been a pleasure working on this project with the US leadership team,” said Lucy Willcox, Head of Operational Radiology at The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (RWT).
“As usual, they have gone above and beyond to make this a success.
Consultancy room
“This development will also move outpatient scanning into the community to support the NHS improvement strategy, freeing up capacity at New Cross Hospital to improve acute (Emergency Department) and inpatient services.
“The new facility is a more efficient working environment because all specialties – Ultrasound, MRI and CT – are next door to each other.”
More weekend working will take place as staff work to cut waiting times, with patients now being seen seven days a week.
Tash said: “It’s a much better facility than we had before. Having the three specialities next to each other means we collaborate better as previously it was more fragmented, and it’s also better for training when we bring our apprentices over here.
“We can offer patients more flexibility too because scanning can be done at Cannock and New Cross Hospital.”
Phase one of the CDC opened in March this year and it has its own dedicated staff. The new facility performs around 35,000 scans per year and employs up to 70 colleagues.
ENDS
- For further information, please call Tim Nash on 07714 741097 or email tim.nash2@nhs.net
