A new £160m Cancer Centre at Guy’s Hospital, designed by Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners and specialist healthcare architect Stantec has now been opened. It has been designed around the needs of patients and staff with the aim of unifying world-class cancer treatments and research in an uplifting, non-institutional and clinically efficient healthcare setting.
The Cancer Centre brings together most cancer treatment under one roof – previously cancer care was provided in 13 different locations in eight different buildings on the St Thomas’ and Guy’s sites. To create a welcoming, human scale patient and staff experience, the 14-storey building is arranged in four stacked villages – Welcome, Radiotherapy, Outpatients and Chemotherapy – each with its own distinct identity relating to a particular patient need.
The new Cancer Centre at Guy’s is the first hospital in Europe to locate its radiotherapy treatment above ground.
'It is fantastic to welcome the first patients to our new Cancer Centre,' says Dr Majid Kazmi, Clinical Director of Cancer Services at Guy’s and St Thomas’. 'Today is the culmination of more than 10 years of planning and working in partnership with our patients to create a building to transform cancer care.'
Ivan Harbour, Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners Partner in charge of the project, says: 'Architecture has the ability and responsibility to improve people’s lives and nowhere is this more important than in a building dedicated to making people well.
'Our aim has been to create a place equally focused on patient care and treatment, a welcoming building of human scale that does not feel like a hospital but delivers state-of-the-art treatment in an uplifting environment for patients, their families and staff.'
The Cancer Centre at Guy’s has been designed by architect Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners and specialist healthcare architect Stantec for Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust. Arup provided integrated design engineering services. Main contractor Laing O’Rourke built the Cancer Centre and led the project team. AECOM has provided integrated cost consultancy and project management services and risk management services. The project has been managed by Essentia, Guy’s and St Thomas’ in-house provider of integrated healthcare solutions.
'This unique Cancer Centre was formed from the expressed wishes of patients and numerous site challenges,' says Catherine Zeliotis, Stantec Healthcare Leader at Stantec and Clinical Design Lead for the project. 'It will become a welcoming, non-institutional daily home to staff, patients and their families, planned in village clusters that provide a bright and nature-filled experience enhancing patient care.'
David Martin, Vice President at Stantec, adds: 'We are delighted to have participated in the design of this transformative cancer facility which will set new standards for integrating excellent patient care while enhancing medical research – all in a new kind of building which is non-institutional, comforting and inspiring.'
The arts programme, which has been curated by cultural placemaking specialists Futurecity, embeds work by five world-class artists into the design of the new centre.
The aim has been to create a welcoming building of human scale that does not feel like a hospital
The new Cancer Centre at Guy’s also brings together treatment and research in an Innovation Hub. Professor Peter Parker, Head of the Division of Cancer Studies at King's College London, says: 'Our vision is for the Innovation Hub to cross-fertilise ideas between researchers and clinicians so that potentially impactful discoveries can be advanced rapidly and successful approaches for one cancer type can be tested quickly in others.'
Laing O’Rourke’s Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DfMA) approach supported Arup engineers to ensure the building could be designed and delivered to the highest quality and as a result the building is targeted to achieve BREEAM Healthcare Excellence Rating.
'Collaboration has been key to the successful delivery of the Cancer Centre. Our approach to providing an integrated service offering for project and cost management went beyond the more traditional “contractual role”, enabling our experts to embed themselves within our client’s organisation from the very start,' explains AECOM’s Richard Tunstall, Director, Project Management.
'We are delighted to have been part of the team that has delivered a project that will make such a difference to cancer care across a wide region.'
- Companies:
- Aecom
- Laing O'Rourke
- Ove Arup and Partners
- Rogers Stirk Harbour and Partners LLP
- Stantec
- Lexica
