Media Release
Thursday 11 June 2009 

Bristol City Council has granted planning permission for the extension to Henshaw House in the grounds of Cossham Hospital. Henshaw House will accommodate the services currently houses in the main hospital building while the main building is refurbished. 

NHS South Gloucestershire has also applied for planning and listed building consent to refurbish Cossham Hospital and hopes to have a response from Bristol City Council by early September.

“This is another small milestone as we move towards refurbishing Cossham Hospital. We have spent years consulting and working with partners to agree what services the NHS will provide from Cossham. Now we are in the final phase which includes working with architects to see how we can transform the building and applying for planning permission,” said Penny Harris, Chief Executive of NHS South Gloucestershire.

Cossham Hospital, built in 1907, is a distinctive building with many features and NHS South Gloucestershire plans to repair these. The tower, the gatehouse and the frontage will all be sensitively repaired and remain for future generations to enjoy. Architects’ plans show a one storey extension to the rear of the main hospital building to provide modern facilities for scanners and a second one storey extension to the rear of the “stable block” to provide a renal dialysis unit.

Cossham Hospital currently provides limited diagnostic and outpatient services but after the redevelopment, will deliver a new range of state-of-the-art healthcare which will include double the number of outpatient appointments, a new minor injuries service, X-Ray, ultrasound, MRI and CT scanning, double the number of physiotherapy appointments, other therapy services such as speech and language and audiology, a new renal dialysis satellite unit and the first stand-alone, midwife-led birthing centre in South Gloucestershire and Bristol.

Work is due to begin on the extension to Henshaw House in August this year. Once the work is completed in December 2009, services will be provided from the new facility as the main building is vacated for builders. Henshaw House will be demolished once the main building has been refurbished. 

Henshaw House is currently occupied by a number of South Gloucestershire community teams. They will move to a new temporary base in the Vassalls Centre in Fishponds this summer as will the Crossroads voluntary organisation. The Physiotherapy Department and the Mobile MRI Scanner will stay where they are until the work on the main building has been completed.

The milestones are as follows:

For more information please contact Fiona Reid or Sue Pratt on 0117 330 2451/2499.

To top of page