Hairmyres Hospital

Hairmyres Hospital, or simply known as "Hairmyres" by local residents, is a busy district general hospital with 24-hour Accident and Emergency facilities and has 434 inpatient beds and 20 day beds in East Kilbride, South Lanarkshire, Scotland NHS Lanarkshire. Services include Accident and Emergency, General Medicine, Oncology, Psychiatry, Care of the Elderly, General Surgery, Orthopaedics, and Cardiothoracic Surgery. It serves one of the largest elderly populations in Scotland.

Population
Hairmyres Hospital serves approximately  patients in the South Lanarkshire catchment area. It forms one of three acute hospitals in NHS Lanarkshire. The others being Wishaw General Hospital and Monklands Hospital

History
The first building on the site was the Lanarkshire Inebriate Reformatory, formally opened on 1 December 1904. Only a handful of patients received treatment over the years, and the Reformatory closed in February 1911.

Lanarkshire County Council purchased a nearby farm and established a tuberculosis sanatorium and working farm colony. The Hairmyres site was well suited, being accessible from major centres of population, yet set in a hillside over 500 feet above sea level and with its own supply of fresh food. Building started in December 1914 and continued through the First World War, with local workmen being assisted by German prisoners of war. The Secretary for Scotland, Sir Robert Munro conducted the official opening on 14 June 1919. The new buildings were in a crescent formation, facing south for maximum exposure to sunlight. They comprised a male, female and children's pavilion and an observation block. A two-storey administration block contained the matron's and medical superintendent's offices, pharmacy, staff dining rooms and the matron's, nurses' and maids' living quarters. The former reformatory building was converted for use as a school. There were a total of 250 beds at Hairmyres. The farm colony gave practical training in outdoor occupations to the recuperating patients. The farm had a herd of tuberculin-tested Ayrshire cows, supplying milk butter and a source of income from the sale of calves. There was also a poultry farm and a piggery.

During the 1930's the site was expanded to provide a 400 bed general hospital, including an orthopaedic department. By the end of the decade there was a new treatment block that included two operating theatres, a radiology department, two gymnasia and a new pharmacy. A new nurses' home was opened in 1937. In 1938 there were seven sisters, eight staff nurses, three assistant nurses and forty-one probationers.

In 1938, the government established an Emergency Medical Service (E.M.S.) for the expected influx of military and civilian casualties from the anticipated war with Germany. Hairmyres, with its rural location yet good road and rail links was considered an ideal site. Between April 1939 and January 1941 18 new huts were built, with wards containing nearly 400 new beds. A new ward in the old reformatory building, gave Hairmyres a total of 1,090 beds. The first major influx of war casualties came in 1940. Servicemen from Britain, France, Poland, Canada, New Zealand and Australia were patients, with a small number of wounded German and Italian prisoners of war. On 7 January 1942, a Canadian Orthopaedic Unit was established at Hairmyres. This unit, funded by the Canadian Red Cross, occupied wards 9, 10 and 11 and was run by Canadian nurses. Between 14 January 1942 and 18 September 1945, the unit admitted a total of 5,090 patients and carried out 2,347 operations. Post war, the Scottish Hospitals' Survey recommended that Hairmyres should continue as a general hospital with 750 beds, with a proportion of beds for treating tuberculosis and chest diseases.

Tuberculosis sanatoria concentrated on therapy involving a nutritious diet, exposure to fresh air and sunshine and graduated physical exercise. The antibiotic, streptomycin was discovered in the U.S.A. in 1942. It enabled previously ill patients to be made fit for surgery. The first patient to receive streptomycin in Scotland, was author and journalist, George Orwell. Orwell was admitted to Hairmyres on Christmas Eve 1946. At the time of his admission he was writing his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. The staff, insisting that complete physical and mental rest was essential for effective treatment, confiscated his typewriter. With rest, his health improved to some extent but attempts to rest his badly affected lung by simple surgical procedures were not successful. He suffered severe side effects from his treatment, and although the disease was responding, it had to be stopped after fifty days. The remaining supplies of streptomycin were administered, with success, to two other patients. Orwell spent the remainder of his stay writing, walking in the grounds and playing croquet. In July 1947 he returned to his rented house on Jura but his health gradually deteriorated and he moved to a sanatorium in the Cotswolds and died in January 1950 in University College Hospital, London, aged 46.

On 5 July 1948 Hairmyres Hospital was transferred to the Western Regional Hospital Board, one of five regional boards created in Scotland under the National Health Service (Scotland) Act (1947). In the years following the war, there was little investment in hospital buildings in Britain. Plans to upgrade Hairmyres to District General Hospital status were shelved. By 1950 the number of beds had fallen to 450, about two-thirds of the number envisaged in the 1945 survey. The New Town of East Kilbride was established in 1947 within a mile of Hairmyres Hospital, creating an increasing demand. The 1966 Lanarkshire Hospital Development Plan proposed two district hospitals in Lanarkshire, one in Motherwell and the other in Airdrie. There were no major development plans for Hairmyres. However, the hospital was to continue to have acute admitting facilities with "a functional relationship" with a Glasgow teaching hospital. This dependence was felt to be unsatisfactory by staff. Hairmyres had to wait until the establishment of Lanarkshire Health Board before any major redevelopment could begin.

On 1 April 1974 the National Health Service (Scotland) Act (1972) created fifteen new health boards in place of regional boards, hospital boards of management, executive councils and local government health authorities. Over the following years, the new Lanarkshire Health Board transformed the status of Hairmyres to the advantage of the local community. During the 70's, 80's and 90's they invested in both staff and facilities. An increase in specialisation meant patients no longer had to travel to one of the Glasgow teaching hospitals for treatment. The board opened a new gymnasium, new clinical laboratories, a cardiac investigation and a bronchoscopy unit.

On 1 April 1994 Hairmyres Hospital acquired trust status and the redevelopment of the hospital on the ground behind the Nurses' Home began. The Hospital has now been totally rebuilt into a modern purpose built District General Hospital, with special expertise in Respiratory and Cardiac Care, and an expanded day-care/ambulatory surgery service. It has also built up new services, including Cardiac Catheterisation, Psychiatry and Elderly care.

NHS Lanarkshire
NHS Lanarkshire is responsible for the health of more than 553,000 people living within the North and South Lanarkshire local authority areas.

There are three district general hospitals in the area - Hairmyres, Monklands and Wishaw General Hospital. Each of these hospitals has an accident and emergency department and provides a range of specialist medical and surgical services. Maternity, gynaecology and paediatric services are based at Wishaw General Hospital. Ophthalmology and cardiothoracics are centralised at Hairmyres.

Primary health care is provided in the community and includes general practitioners (GPs), dentists, pharmacists, health visitors and a wide range of health professionals. NHS Lanarkshire's primary care facilities include health centres and 17 community and day hospitals.

NHS Lanarkshire employs more than 12,000 staff.

The Hospital
Hairmyres Hospital is a private finance initiative (PFI) hospital located in East Kilbride, Scotland. It was built by Kier Group and opened in September 2001.



The wards, bed capacity and their specialities are:

Along with these areas, the hospital also has an A&E department and a day surgery unit.

Other Services
 * A full range of inpatient, outpatient, diagnostic and clinical support services.
 * Lanarkshire's only cardiac catheterisation centre consisting of two new state-of-the-art catheterisation laboratories for diagnosis and treatment of blood vessel blockages around the heart.
 * MRI scanner.
 * 60 psychiatric beds.

Centralised Services and Hairmyres Development Plan
As part of NHS Lanarkshire's A Picture of Health consultation on the future of service provision within Lanarkshire, the centralisation of specialist services at the most appropriate site is an ongoing process. The centralisation of services to Wishaw General and Hairmyres has been discussed.



Acute Services Review
NHS Lanarkshire's "Picture of Health" document suggests the downgrading to two consultant-led A&E departments, with Monklands and Hairmyres the choice for downgrading. This will lead to the removal of the ITU, CCU and possibly other services, with the concentration of emergency admissions on two sites; Wishaw being one of the two level three hospitals. The level two hospital will have a nurse-led minor injuries unit, along with performing planned surgery, full diagnostic/outpatient services and general medicine.

At a stormy meeting held in Bell College, Hamilton on June 27 a decision was made by Lanarkshire Health Board to downgrade Monklands Hospital to a level two hospital by a vote of 19 to 1. Local MSPs and MPs including the Home Secretary, Dr. John Reid have vowed to contest this decision. The Board submitted the decisions taken in respect of 'A Picture of Health' to the Deputy Minister for Health and Community Care, Lewis Macdonald MSP, for consideration and approval in June 2006.

On 21 August 2006, Lewis Macdonald MSP ratified NHS Lanarkshire's "Picture of Health" proposals to a storm of protest from community groups and local politicians including the home secretary, Dr John Reid MP.

Monklands A&E Department was set for closure under plans introduced by the Scottish Labour Government before the Scottish Election in 2007. However, Nicola Sturgeon (Deputy Leader of SNP) overturned this decision when the Scottish National Party came to power.