Life-saving transplant centre for Freeman Hospital

Jul 4 2009 by Amy Hunt, The Journal

MORE lives will be saved and generous organ donations will not go to waste thanks to an innovative new centre.

Councillors gave the go-ahead for a new Institute of Transplantation to be built at the Freeman Hospital in Newcastle.

The £26m project will bring operating theatres, intensive care and recovery wards under one roof for the first time, making the hospital a world leader in organ transplant operations.

Last night, Sir Len Fenwick, chief executive of Newcastle Hospitals, said organs like hearts, lungs and livers which currently sometimes go to waste because there are insufficient facilities to deal with them, will now be used to save more lives.

Sir Len said: “With these facilities and the organ donation pool available to us we can increase transplantation by 30% and avoid the disruption that the transplant process can bring to normal hospital procedures.

“Transplantation is unpredictable and the impact can have serious knock-on consequences, to the cancelling of other operations. At the moment there are organs that become available which aren’t used and that’s simply not acceptable.

“We need to have the facilities in place if there’s to be further campaigning for development in the availability of people being prepared to be prospective donors. And you’ve got to be able to match that with the skills and infrastructure to ensure that not one single organ suitable for transplant is wasted.”

Two years ago the Government set a target of increasing the number of transplant operations by 50% over the next three years, a target which hospital bosses say the new unit will help them achieve.

Work on the three-storey building will start straight away, with construction beginning in the autumn.