Publish date: 2 March 2023
We are delighted to see that the Nightingale Surge Hub at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals is now fully operational having welcomed its first patients at the end of January 2022.
Initially 30 beds will be utilised at this facility with more to come online. This marks an amazing achievement by colleagues across the Lancashire Procurement Cluster's (LPC) Procurement and Logistics & Supply Chain departments - whose commitment and desire to meet the project's deadline meant that despite the disruption of Christmas and New Year celebrations, there were no delays in delivering this crucial project.
The Procurement team had the task of procuring the required equipment within a limited time, as well as completing all the due diligence processes, ensuring that the project was not delayed. Meanwhile our Materials Management team based at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals were on hand with logistics support and ensuring that the equipment was delivered on time and installed with Ingenica inventory management systems.
Although nationally pressures have eased recently, the NHS and care services across Lancashire and South Cumbria has continued to see sustained levels of pressure, with high levels of bed occupancy, from the impact Omicron has had on hospital admissions in recent weeks, high staff absences due to Covid-19, and high demand for services as a result of annual winter pressures, all coming together to create a very challenging situation.
Shoutout to Kevin Fletcher, Simon Bennett, Neil Parkinson, Helen Charnley, Deborah Watson, Jake Treacy and Julie Gelder for the gallant effort throughout this project.