THE chief executive of the NHS Louisa Jordan has stressed it will provide a high level of care that protects the "privacy and dignity" of patients.

Work on the emergency hospital at the Scottish Events Campus (SEC) in Glasgow was completed on Sunday.

The now-operational hospital will have an initial capacity for 300 beds, which can be expanded to more than 1,000 if needed.
Chief Executive Jill Young moved to reassure people about the level of care at the site.

She said that the hospital's design incorporated safe infection control, compassionate care and the privacy and dignity of patients.

"We've built that into the design here," she said. "So I would like to give that absolute reassurance that patients should feel every confidence if they have to come here for their care."

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The hospital is named after Glasgow-born First World War nurse Sister Louisa Jordan, who died on active service in Serbia in 1915 as part of Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Services.

Contractors involved in the construction of NHS Louisa Jordan are Balfour Beatty Group, Kier Group, Robertson Group and Graham Construction.

Young paid tribute to those teams, saying: "It's just over two weeks, just look at the standard and quality of the beds here.

"It's just been incredible to bring together 700-800 construction workers, support teams, clinical staff, NHS teams to have designed, constructed and mobilised in over two weeks.

"It's just remarkable and my thanks go out to all of them for doing that."

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She added: "These guys are experts of what they do. We do emergency planning in the NHS and we do design and construct hospitals.

"We did know the dynamics of what had to be here and what had to be aligned so in addition to what you see here, we also have all essential support."

Among the support included at the SEC is a chemist, CT scanner, catering, cleaning, portering and "everything you would expect in a hospital", Young said.

Specific "triggers" will be in place for the hospital to be put to use if needed, she said, and can care for Covid-19 patients from across Scotland.

Young added: "There will be specific procedures we will have to put in place for infection control and the nurses and other staff will have to wear you know their PPE equipment when they're caring for patients.

"But wherever possible we're trying to maintain as normal a lifestyle that they would expect in the hospital while they're here.

"Hopefully they wouldn't be here for too long and we'll get them discharged back home to the families and their loved ones."

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