Hospital converting toilets for extra clinical space

A hospital that will not be rebuilt for at least 12 years is being forced to convert tiny spaces, including toilets, to see patients, staff said.

Royal Berkshire Hospital (RBH) bosses have urged the government to rebuild it for years but in January it was told it would not be rebuilt until at least 2037.

Some parts of the Reading hospital are almost 200 years old and millions of pounds is being spent on maintenance for buildings that cannot be used by patients.

Consultant Omar Nafousi said when he started at the hospital's emergency department in 2011, staff were expected to see 150 patients a day. Now they can see up to 500.

"A business would be proud of that [increase] – but we're not a business," he said.

"We've expanded a little bit but not enough. That's our biggest constraint right now: capacity and where you can see patients.

"We've tried everything. We've even converted a toilet into a cubicle just to be able to get that tiny bit of space."

Dom Hardy, the hospital's chief operating officer, told BBC Radio 4's PM programme that water "hoses" through some of its buildings when it rains.

"There comes a point at which patching just isn't enough," he said, adding: "You've actually got to think about whether you should have this building at all."

He said £2.4m had been spent on a listed building that could not be used clinically but needed to be maintained.

Steve McManus, the Royal Berkshire NHS Trust's chief executive, told BBC Radio Berkshire that current funding for the hospital's £100m of backlog maintenance "isn't keeping up with the level of deterioration in certain parts we see on the site."

Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced an extra £29bn for the NHS in England in her Spending Review on 11 June.

Mr McManus said that while additional funding would help day-to-day spending and was "welcome", it would not fix the structural problems at the hospital site.

The RBH was told it would receive a share of £4.4m for repairs earlier this month.

Announcing the money, Health Secretary Wes Streeting said: "A decade and a half of underinvestment left hospitals crumbling, with burst pipes flooding emergency departments, faulty electrical systems shutting down operating theatres, and mothers giving birth in outdated facilities that lack basic dignity."

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