Royal Sussex County Hospital


The Royal Sussex County Hospital is an acute teaching hospital in Brighton, England. Together with the Princess Royal Hospital, it is administered by the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust. The services provided at the hospital include an emergency department, cancer services at the Sussex Cancer Centre, cardiac surgery, maternity services, and both adult and neonatal intensive care units.

History

The main building was designed by Charles Barry, who was later architect for the Houses of Parliament, and is still called the Barry Building. The foundation stone was laid by the Earl of Egremont on 16 March 1826, and the hospital was opened as the Sussex County Hospital on 11 June 1828. The Victoria Wing was added in 1839, and the Adelaide Wing was opened in 1841. The Sussex County Hospital became the Royal Sussex County Hospital in about 1911.
On New Year's Day 1872, a fire broke out on the top floor of the Adelaide Wing of the hospital, in Ward 6. Initially this fire threatened to destroy the building, but the efforts of volunteer firefighters and a detachment of the 19th Hussars saved the building.
The Jubilee Building was added to the hospital in 1887 and the Sussex Eye Hospital opened in 1935.
In October 1984, after the Provisional IRA bombed the Grand Hotel where members of the Government were staying during the Conservative Party annual conference, the hospital received many of the injured.
In 2005 an episode of the BBC investigative programme Panorama featured secretly filmed material taken by a nurse and an undercover journalist. The programme highlighted serious failings in the standards of care and procedures and showed scenes that were described by the Chief Executive of the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust, which is responsible for the hospital, as "very disturbing images".
The Millennium Building was completed in 2000 and the Audrey Emerton Building, built to accommodate clinical medical students of Brighton and Sussex Medical School, was opened by Baroness Emerton in 2005. In 2009 there was a proposal to demolish the Barry and Jubilee buildings as part of a £300m redevelopment scheme. On 1 May 2014, £420 million of public investment was approved for redevelopment works starting in late 2014 and expected to last until 2024.