Work begins on 'transformational' new £25 million Slough NHS health centre

Spades have hit the ground in Slough as work begins on a new £25 million health hub which NHS chiefs say will ‘transform’ care in the area.

Slough Community Community Diagnostics Centre (CDC), under development at Upton Court Hospital, is expected to be ready to open by December 2025.

A ‘groundbreaking’ ceremony attended by regional NHS health leaders, Slough MP Tan Dhesi and Slough Mayor Dhillon, was held at the building site on Friday.

Speaking at the ceremony, NHS Frimley Health Foundation Trust chief executive officer Lance McCarthy told the Express:

“This is genuinely a transformational project to support the local residents - about 150,000 scans a year will go through this centre”

NHS Frimley Health Foundation Trust runs Wexham Park Hospital in Slough and Heatherwood Hospital in Ascot. It will be running Slough CDC once construction is finished.

Building work is being completed by Western Building Systems Ltd and NHS Property Services.

The new CDC is expected to greatly reduce waiting lists for people living around Slough. 

Once completed, Slough CDC will be open seven days a week and for 12 hours a day.

It is expected to ease pressure on Wexham Park Hospital and help reduce waiting lists in Slough, Windsor and East Berkshire.

Patients will be able to access MRIs (magnetic resonance image) and CT (computed tomography) scans – two of the most important scans medics use to detect illnesses.

In addition, blood testing and physiology tests will be available as well as other complex scans.

Timely scanning and identification of illnesses is vital to give patients the best care, but waiting lists for these checks – and other healthcare services - can be lengthy.  

An NHS Frimley Health trust board meeting last month heard how there were 85,000 people on waiting lists for care at its hospitals.

Mr McCarthy said Slough CDC would help bring down waiting lists for people living in and around Slough.

He said: “Since the pandemic there’s been a big increase in patients waiting for all sorts of planned activity, both from surgery all the way down through diagnostics and outpatients.

“This massively increases the amount of capacity we have available to meet the needs of those patients and will ensure that we can continue to ensure patients can get quicker diagnostics.

“It will make a huge difference in terms of reducing waiting times.”

NHS Frimley Health trust chief strategy officer James Clarke said: "This is an exciting moment for the Trust and the people of Slough.

“The £25 million Slough CDC will play a vital role in addressing health inequalities by ensuring that diagnostic services are accessible to everyone, regardless of where they live.”

Slough MP Tan Dhesi said he was pleased healthcare investment was taking place in Slough to help alleviate ‘acute’ healthcare needs in the area.

“I want to congratulate Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust,” he said.

 “I also want to make sure I’m working collaboratively with them to ensure that the government is providing the funding and resources that’s needed because we have some very acute health needs here.”

You can read about how NHS Frimley Health Foundation Trust is using AI to reduce waiting lists for cancer patients here.