Staff Reporter
WINDHOEK – A new chapter in the history of the private Welwitschia Hospital in Walvis Bay began a week ago with the official ground-breaking ceremony for the new intensive care unit (ICU) and surgical ward.
The facility will add more than 1,300 square metres to the existing hospital, thus increasing patient capacity as well as expanding intensive care and emergency services.
Construction is expected to be completed in May 2019 whereafter patient care will commence in the new wards.
“Welwitschia Hospital continuously seeks to transform patient care with the focus on delivering our inimitable brand of specialised and corresponding care. Advancing the manner in which patient care is delivered requires state-of-the-art facilities which are specifically designed to provide patients with a healing environment,” said Dr Andrey Kornilov, a specialist anaesthetist and head of ICU at Welwitschia.
Kornilov explained that during the planning phase due attention was given to delivering leading edge and coordinated care in an innovative new facility.
Apart from the increase in beds, the new ICU will have three isolation rooms for contagious patients, a central monitoring system and emergency haemodialysis for patients with acute kidney failure.
There will also be a small ICU laboratory to control rapid changed parameters at bedside, all necessary technical premises, storerooms, staff offices and a very comfortable and individual briefing area for the patients’ relatives, said Kornilov.
Welwitschia Hospital is also moving from a 63-bed to a 95-bed hospital. This will address the growing demand for healthcare in Walvis Bay as a result of the ongoing developments in Erongo, the rapid expansion of the town and the increase in trauma and motor vehicle accidents.
The state-of-the art facility is designed by Conrad Scheffer Architects with specific instructions to match the highest modern world standards of such specific units. The innovative concept is also based on a philosophy of patient-centered care.
Hefer Projects Namibia, the contractor, is entrusted with the construction of this new ICU unit and surgical ward to the value of N$30 million, including
equipment.
There has been an increase in medical specialists of various disciplines relocating to and setting up permanent practices in Walvis Bay in the last three years, according to a press release from Welwitschia Hospital.
“It is indeed an exciting time for Welwitschia Hospital as this development and future expansion is setting a template for improving health and delivering outstanding care to the community in which it operates and the country at large,” Linda Schultz, the communications manager at Erongo Medical Group, said.