60 beds still closed after devastating fire at Southampton General Hospital
500 patients were moved to safety after the fire
Around 60 hospital beds remain closed almost nine months after the devastating fire at Southampton General Hospital, NHS bosses have revealed.
The blaze on February 1 caused extensive damage to the hospital’s west wing and destroyed its endoscopy unit, with 502 patients moved to safety.
More than 100 firefighters tackled the fire, which was later found to have been caused by an electrical fault.
Andy Hyett, University Hospital Southampton (UHS) chief operating officer, said the trust remained on a “very long journey” to restore the hospital.
Speaking at the annual members’ meeting on Monday, October 19, Mr Hyett said areas at the centre of the fire had been stripped “right back to concrete and brick” before they could be rebuilt.
He said: “As we’ve recovered, we’ve started to get services back online but still now we’ve still got roughly 60 beds closed.
“We’ve still got our entire endoscopy unit closed and two outpatient departments.”
The number of unavailable beds has fallen significantly since the aftermath of the fire, when 137 adult beds were out of use.
Mr Hyett said the disruption had affected “virtually everybody” at the hospital, with services moved both around the site and elsewhere.
The hospital’s eight-suite endoscopy service was among those badly affected, with teams forced to work at different locations around Hampshire.
UHS has brought mobile endoscopy facilities into use as part of its recovery.
Almost nine months on, trust leaders said the fire was continuing to take an emotional toll on hospital staff.
New chief executive Dr Trevor Smith said colleagues at a fire debrief meeting last week had become “quite tearful”.
He said: “I hadn’t fully appreciated that longer term impact of the fire and how that was making our colleagues and our teams feel, so we’ve got ongoing work to support our staff.”
Outgoing chief executive David French praised the response of staff, saying the evacuation and subsequent recovery had been “truly remarkable and truly humbling”.
Mr Hyett, who was strategic commander during the incident, said lessons from what he described as the “biggest fire in NHS history” would be shared to help make the organisation safer.