When the new Critical Services Building opens later this year, it will transform the Canberra Hospital campus.

Many of our critical care services will be relocated in Critical Services Building, which will create a better-connected and person-centred hospital.

The Critical Services Building has been built to future proof our acute care services. As our community grows overtime and into the future, so too will our services.

While it is important to note that services will continue to be provided at their usual facilities for the time being, we want to help the community better understand where they can access services once the new building opens.

The Critical Services Building will include the Canberra Hospital’s Main Reception, as well as the following services:

Emergency Department (ED) with dedicated children’s emergency area - located on street level, the new ED will have its own dedicated entrance, which also has improved features to enhance the safety of patient and visitor pick-up and drop-off. It will have room to grow as our community grows in the years to come. It will have better connections between our acute services, as well as direct lift access between the new Helipad and the ED. The ED will also include a dedicated children’s emergency area, which will enable paediatric patients, carers, and families to be co-located in an appropriate care environment that is separate to the rest of the ED, with its own triage and waiting area.

Operating theatres – located on level 3, the new operating theatres include state-of-the-art hybrid and interventional radiology suites to allow the latest advances in medical technology to be used.

Sterilising Services Unit – located on level 4, the centralised Sterilising Services Unit will have the latest equipment and machinery. It will also have direct lift access from the operating theatres in the building to improve efficiency and workflows.

Intensive Care Unit (ICU) – located on Level 5 of the building, the new ICU will increase bed capacity overtime to ensure ICU capacity can grow with our community’s health needs. New features to enhance patient wellbeing include two outdoor terraces that are connected to the ICU that enable patients to go outside as part of the healing and recovery. One of these terraces will also provide a dedicated visitor courtyard that can be accessed through a visitor’s lounge, supporting families and carers at a vulnerable and stressful time.

Inpatient Cardiology Services – located on level 6, Cardiology services will be comprised of the Acute Cardiac Care Unit, the Cardiac Catheter Labs, and the Cardiac Day Unit. We are co-locating these services in the building to support smooth transfers of patients between services. The Cardiac Care Unit will expand, the number of Cardiac Catheter labs will increase, and there will also be a dedicated lab for cardiac electrophysiology procedures as well as a larger lab to accommodate more complex procedures such as TAVI (transcatheter aortic valve implantation). The electrophysiology (EP) laboratory uses advanced technology and equipment to conduct electrophysiology studies of the heart.

Inpatient wards – located on levels 6 and 7, there will be five inpatient wards throughout, providing both surgical and medical inpatient beds. The wards will include Acute Medical Unit, Emergency General Surgery and Trauma, Neurosurgery and Oral Maxillofacial Surgery and Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery.

Medical Imaging – while the main medical imaging suites at Canberra Hospital will remain located in Building 12 at Canberra Hospital, there will be additional medical imaging facilities in the Critical Services Building, including four X-ray rooms, three CT Scanners, two ultrasound rooms and another two MRI units.

There is significant work underway to prepare for the transition of services into the new building later this year. After construction is completed, we will begin preparing the new hospital building and our health workforce for the commencement of services. This includes training and orientation, as well testing of processes and procedures.

Before the Critical Services Building begins to receive patients, we will also provide community tours for Canberrans to visit the new building and learn more about the services that will be operating from it. We’ll have more information about these opportunities as we get close to the building opening.

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