BC announces concept planning for new Surrey hospital

Dec 19 2017, 4:59 am

British Columbia is taking the first steps toward building a new hospital in Surrey, Health Minister Adrian Dix announced on Monday.

“Surrey Memorial Hospital delivers first-class health care, but we recognize with a rapidly growing community that access to this care is becoming difficult for a great number of people,” said Dix in statement.

“Today we are taking the first planning step in making sure people living in this region have better access to quality care.”

The Ministry of Health, together with Fraser Health, is funding a concept plan for a new hospital in Surrey.

The concept plan will lay out the need for a specific project and identify potential locations. A request for proposals is being released, seeking a consultant to begin this work.

The move was supported by the region’s health board, Fraser Health.

“With the continued growth of the community in the coming years, an additional hospital in Surrey will provide an opportunity to expand our care services to reflect the needs of the people living and working here,” said Fraser Health chair Jim Sinclair.

“This expansion will ensure people can access these services when they need them.”

Concept planning a year-long process

Once government completes the review and approval of a concept plan, the ministry’s next stage in the planning process would be to move forward with a business plan.

The government said the concept planning stage will take approximately one year to complete.

However, overall timelines for the new hospital project would vary depending on each stage of completion, with new hospital builds ranging from between six to 10 years from concept plan to project completion.

Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner welcomed the move to build a new hospital.

“The staff at Surrey Memorial Hospital do an incredible job… but they are clearly stretched,” she said.

“With the growth Surrey is experiencing, a new hospital is clearly needed, if we are to ensure our residents have timely access to medical care and services.”

In 2013-14, Surrey Memorial Hospital saw:

  • 117,562 emergency room visits
  • 28,859 inpatients treated
  • 10,067 surgical daycare cases
  • 4,168 babies delivered
  • 155,119 visits to ambulatory care
See also
Eric ZimmerEric Zimmer

+ News
+ Architecture & Design
+ Urbanized
ADVERTISEMENT