Community Diagnostic Centre at Barking Hospital – East London, United Kingdom

ModuleCo delivered a turnkey modular Community Diagnostic Centre (CDC) project for Barking, Havering, Redbridge University Hospitals NHS Trust at Barking Community Hospital. It was one of the first of the forty new community diagnostic facilities the government promised to fund for the NHS.

The modular CDC will see 50,000 scans and tests take place every year, while helping speed up diagnosis and treatment of patients in the local community.

One particular innovation will support people with certain types of cancer. It is a minimally invasive procedures using a cytosponge that “detects cancer or pre-cancerous conditions of the stomach and gullet, and colon capsules – a capsule containing a small disposable camera which, once swallowed, takes thousands of pictures as it travels along the gut to help identify the cause of symptoms”, according to the Trust.

The facility itself was manufactured to almost 90% complete off-site at our specialist manufacturing centre in Gloucestershire. This helped to reduce the overall project programme as the facility was being built at the same time as the enabling works took place on site, with the added benefit of minimising disruption on a small hospital site and to the local community.

Our design team carried out extensive early engagement with those who would become the facility’s end users, ensuring that the accommodation, equipment and level of finish we provided would be precisely what patients and staff require.

The ground floor arrangement comprises specialist CT and MRI Scanning rooms with a central control room to support both areas. Alongside the specialist areas are seven diagnostic/assessment rooms ranging from Cardiology to Phlebotomy, each tailored to the needs of the NHS staff who will work within. Patients and staff enter the facility into a large open plan waiting/entrance lobby where an integrated reception desk will greet and assist them.

The heart of the facility features support space for the specialist diagnostic/assessment rooms, such as clean and dirty utilities and a changing places room, providing efficient and safe patient/staff access. The facility incorporates a platform lift and two stair cores to the North and South to improve access to the first floor.

Included on the first floor is an abundance of staff facilities, from change areas to shower and rest spaces. The first floor design has been future proofed to enable retrofit, should the Trust require further diagnostic/assessment areas.

As with many new healthcare facility projects, BREEAM was a key requirement. This project targeted an ‘Excellent’ rating by utilising low carbon technologies such as air source heat pumps and PV panels, which fill the available roof space. The performance of the building’s thermal envelope has also been enhanced to meet the newly introduced Part L building regulations, further assisting the efficient heating and cooling of the new facility.

ModuleCo also managed the challenging enabling works package, which involved coordination between UKPN, Essex and Suffolk Water and Transport for London.

A new HV power supply was brought to site, housed within a new traditionally-built substation, built by ModuleCo specifically for the new facility. Resilience to the new feed will be provided by a standby generator which will pick up the buildings load in the event of a mains power outage. New water and fibre supplies were also created, rendering the new facility standalone from the rest of the hospital site.

On visiting the finished building for the first time, the Trust’s patient advisory group remarked “1st class!”, “Fantastic. So bright and airy.” and “A great example for others to follow.” 

At the opening of the facility, Professor Sir Mike Richards, the pioneer of CDCs, remarked: “The idea of CDCs started about four years ago and it’s a pleasure to be here for the opening. It is a fantastic centre, it feels spacious and it’s really going to help us get the time to diagnosis reduced, back to where it should be.”