The long-awaited rebuild of the Nelson hospital will now consist of several smaller buildings and use existing infrastructure, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti has said.
Costs are expected to remain around $1 billion, raising questions about the rationale for the change.
Reti said the redevelopment of Nelson Hospital remained a priority for the government and recent seismic surveys showed that the two key buildings, the George Manson and Percy Brunette blocks, could be redeveloped to a greater extent than previously thought.
“There are parts of those buildings that will have a longer life than originally anticipated… they may well be suitable to be placed in administration and management rather than perhaps the higher [seismic] level you might need for patient beds.”
A 2020 government survey of clinical hospital facilities found the George Manson Building to be the worst building in the country.
Engineers determined that the six-story building and the adjacent Percy Brunette Building were earthquake-prone, and that a major earthquake would likely damage them beyond their usability.
Reti said there were only a handful of Australian companies that could undertake a building project of the size of Dunedin Hospital. By designing smaller buildings in Nelson, domestic construction companies could bid for the work.
“Rather than what we saw in Dunedin, where one vertical structure is built from the ground up with all the associated risks, it is now a good idea to do the construction in phases because it limits the risks.”
Reti said work was underway on the hospital masterplan, while the deadline for the detailed business case had been brought forward by 12 months to the end of the year.
He could not say when the renovated hospital would be ready, but said it would likely be sooner than the previous deadline of 2031.
“This is a great signal to the people of Nelson that we are going to build this hospital, we are on track and we are even on track to see how we can do it even more safely and quickly.”
Nelson MP Rachel Boyack said the minister's visit raised more questions than it answered.
“We are in a state of uncertainty about whether we are actually going to get the beds we need and when we are going to get them.”
The previous government approved a complete rebuild of Nelson Hospital in 2023, after a series of smaller buildings were ruled out.
The $1.1 billion plan included 255 beds instead of the current 161, eight operating rooms instead of six and a larger emergency department, all in one building.
“There is no material difference in cost between a large acute services building that we know meets the needs of the community and a phased approach.
“While it may seem like a good idea, we know it doesn't work so well for patients and medical staff, as they have to move patients between buildings.”
She was concerned that large hospitals such as the one in Dunedin were seen as 'too big' for the New Zealand market.
“Our region is vast and we need large, high-quality facilities in places like Nelson. Patients can’t always be easily transported to other hospitals, so we need laboratory services and intensive care services in a hospital in Nelson.”