NHS Nightingale Hospital

With COVID-19 putting unprecedented pressure on health services, the UK’s National Health Service has added seven temporary Nightingale hospitals to provide local services with back up if extra capacity is needed during the pandemic.

In Bristol, Integral, our mechanical and electrical engineering business joined together with Kier Construction to help convert a university exhibition and conference centre into a critical-care, 300-bed Nightingale hospital in just 20 days.

How we achieved it

On the site of the University of West of England Frenchay campus, the new hospital facility had to be operational in just over three weeks which meant the project required quick-thinking and immediate action.

Our Integral team received an initial call on a Thursday, and undertook a site visit at the conference centre the following day and began working with an external design consultant on the layout of the new Nightingale hospital over that same weekend.

While speed was of the essence, safety was the priority, with contractors adhering to social distancing guidelines while working.

Our Integral team received an initial call on a Thursday, and undertook a site visit at the conference centre the following day and began working with an external design consultant on the layout of the new Nightingale hospital over that same weekend.

The exhibition centre high ceilings and wide open spaces  allowed for a modular approach, creating corridors for power cabling. As the hospital has a patient to medical staff ratio of around one to four, there were also many other elements to consider from breakout areas and changing rooms, to storage areas and pharmacies. They team also supplied and installed showers, taps and cubicles

“With no time to waste budgeting and costing the site was done in a matter of hours” said Andy Demetriou, Head of Projects at Integral. “We’ve found ourselves working with firms who in normal times would be regarded as competitors, but everyone pulled together to get the job done in record time.”

The results

The NHS Nightingale hospital in Bristol was opened by the Earl of Wessex in a virtual ceremony on 27 April.  There are approximately 17 mobile generators on site, more than 7.5km of medical gas pipework, as well as tanks providing 7500 litres per minute of oxygen which all require maintenance support which our Integral FM team are also managing.