Proposals for a new Renal Building at St George’s Hospital, Tooting

We are excited to share our proposals for a new renal building on the St George’s hospital site, Tooting to care for patients with kidney conditions.

The exciting development will mean that renal inpatient services, currently provided at St Helier Hospital and St George’s Hospital, will be co-located in a new purpose-built facility.  Following engagement with staff, patients and local residents, the new specialist centre will bring together expert staff onto one site and provide 24/7 specialist renal care for kidney patients.

The new state-of-the-art facility, designed by BDP Architects, will serve renal patients from south west London, Surrey and its borders. The building will be located on the existing Atkinson Morley carpark, with car parking re-provided elsewhere on the site.

In October and November 2023, we actively engaged with the local community, staff and stakeholders on our plans for the new building, to seek feedback in advance of submitting a planning application to Wandsworth Borough Council.

This included a webinar for residents, staff and patients to hear from the team, including the lead renal clinicians, and ask questions as part of public engagement in advance of the planning submission.

Our engagement period for comments on the proposals has now ended. However you can still contact us with any questions by emailing us on stgeorgesrenalunit@londoncommunications.co.uk.

Why are we doing this?

Together St George’s and St Helier hospitals provide one of the largest renal services in the UK, with a range of services for people with kidney conditions across south west London, Surrey and its borders.

With Epsom and St Helier redeveloping its estate to provide a new specialist emergency hospital in Sutton, renal clinicians from both St Helier and St George’s see this as an opportunity to transform how we provide kidney care for our sickest patients and those who require specialist care, through larger teams of specialist staff, and delivering it in a new purpose-built facility on the St George’s Hospital site.

To take advantage of this opportunity, renal clinicians at St George’s and St Helier submitted a proposal in 2020 to come together and relocate inpatient services in a new purpose-built facility at St George’s.

St George’s Hospital was selected as the location to enable co-location of the new renal centre with intensive care, and other important specialist services that can support care for renal patients.

The need and benefits to our patients

By focusing specialist inpatient treatment in one place, this will allow the outpatient renal teams to further strengthen the care and dialysis services they provide in local hospitals, clinics and at home – where most people would prefer to receive treatment.

The new specialist centre will bring expert staff together onto one site and help us to provide 24/7 care for kidney patients on long-term dialysis requiring inpatient care and for patients who need more complex care such as a kidney transplant.

Focusing specialist renal care in one location will also open up more opportunities for patients to take part in clinical trials, and for clinicians to gather more valuable data regarding effective treatments.

The development of a purpose-built unit means we can use our resources more effectively, provide more patient beds and increase capacity for treatments.

Engagement with patients to date

Before this decision was made, our local commissioners engaged extensively with patients and staff at both hospitals, as well as local people, to explain why we wanted to change how kidney care is delivered and the benefits of the proposed change, as well as to understand any issues and concerns. This included writing to over 3,000 kidney patients, speaking to over 750 patients during 25 visits to kidney clinics, 10 focus groups with equalities groups, two public events and multiple drop-in sessions for staff.

74% of all respondents and 79% of kidney patients who responded in 2021 thought the proposals were either good or very good. The Kidney Patient Associations of St George’s and St Helier also supported the proposals.

The vast majority of kidney services will remain where they are – in local hospitals, clinics and at home.

The site

The exciting new centre of excellence will be located on the St George’s Hospital site, Tooting, utilising the existing Atkinson Morley Wing visitors’ carpark to develop a six-storey state-of-the-art facility. As part of the redevelopment plan, we will be reproviding these visitor parking spaces elsewhere on the hospital campus.

The building sits adjacent to and away from direct line of site of residential houses on Blackshaw Road, ensuring minimal visual impact to residents. There are no existing buildings on the proposed site to warrant disruptive demolition works; the hospital is also not located within a Conservation Area.

Our proposals

The new renal building will provide:

• 70% single rooms with ensuite bathrooms
• A building of the highest environmental standards
• Open garden spaces for public and staff use
• 89 patient beds including higher acuity care, day case beds and bariatric patient beds
• 24 acute dialysis stations including eight single rooms.

The purpose-built, modern healthcare facility will be designed to offer better experiences for patients and staff, with better access to other specialist services. Improving environments both internally and externally whilst allowing an opportunity to enhance the main entrance and accessibility to St George’s from Blackshaw Road and leading up to the Renal Unit and Atkinson Morley Wing, including:

• New footpaths and a widened pedestrian entrance will welcome patients to the hospital from the main public road.
• Closely located ambulance parking bays, blue badge parking spaces and drop-off spaces
• South facing landscaped gardens including spaces for people with reduced mobility, will provide curative spaces for public, patient and staff and provide a vast improvement to the existing environment for years come.

Next steps

Following this period of public engagement, we will finalise design proposals, taking the feedback we’ve received into consideration, and submit a planning application to Wandsworth Borough Council.

Our prospective timeline for the project are as follows (please note these dates are subject to change):

• Submission of planning application: November 2023
• Planning determination: Q1 2024
• Anticipated start on site: Q1/Q2 2025

Opening of new Renal Unit: 2027