AFTER years of efforts from a number of people, Launceston Medical Centre’s much-needed extension and refurbishment works got underway last Tuesday (July 16).

The Launceston Medical Centre Patient Participation Group (PPG) was set up by former chairman Maureen Amy five years ago and since then she has worked side by side with former practice manager Peter Harper and the current incumbent Andrew Yardley to get the go ahead.

Vice-chair of the PPG, Les Whaley addressed town councillors at the latest Launceston Town Council meeting at Launceston Town Hall on Tuesday, July 16, by reading a statement from Mr Yardley which read: “I’m pleased to announce that building work has finally started at the medical centre. Today we have seen fences erected around the site marking the area prior to the start of groundworks.

“Works traffic will eventually enter via the hospital road directly onto the site avoiding the use of the hospital car park and minimising disruption to both the hospital and medical centre.

“Over the last five years we have seen our patient population steadily increase to 18,600 patients resulting in the need to recruit new clinicians and staff. Currently we have completely outgrown our current building.

“Some of our nursing and admin rooms are especially cramped, so it is such a relief to see work finally starting. The first stage is to build the new extension before joining to and refurbishing the existing building. We expect the project to be completed in approximately 18 months.

“We are really excited to see work starting and would like to thank everyone involved, especially our patient participation group who has worked really hard to keep the community informed of our progress as well as collecting useful patient feedback and suggestions for the new building.”

Mr Yardley later told the Post: “The problem we’ve had is that we’ve just outgrown the existing practice. We now have 18,600 patients as opposed to around 14,000 ten years ago.

“Our staff have to work in less than favourable conditions and some rooms don’t even have windows.

“But this has been so long in coming, it’s such a relief. We are working in difficult cramped conditions, so we’re over the moon to see work is starting outside.”

Mr Yardley then explained what the improvements will be.

He said: “There’ll be an additional ten consulting rooms, larger waiting room, new entrance to dispensary as well as additional administration space, an improved staff room, which at the moment is also our meeting room. But there’ll be a separate meeting and staff room, which will make lunch time a lot easier. There’ll also be additional car parking space, doubling the room for cars around the side of the building.

“Also the improvements have been designed in such a way that if we outgrow this space in future, we have scope to add to the second floor.

“But all of this boils down to additional consulting rooms as at the moment we don’t have the space. As our patient list increases, we need additional staff to serve patients.

“We know our patient list is increasing, so now we’ll be able to accommodate that growth. But it’s big news that we’ve seen things starting, it’s such a boost.”

Launceston Medical Centre PPG chairman, Joan Heaton said: “The main instigators have been Peter Harper and Maureen Amy and Andrew Yardley who took over from Peter as practice manager.

“I took over as chair from Maureen 18 months ago after she did it for three years. We’re always happy to answer questions anyone has and we’ll be at the Launceston Show on the Rotary stand on Thursday to answer any questions anyone has.”

Joan continued: “Once it’s finished there’ll be double the parking space there is now and it’ll be a one way system. The entrance will be through Landlake Road as it is now and then they’ll come out on the hospital road. Both roads are at the jurisdiction of highways at Cornwall Council so one of the reasons why this has taken so long to get going is we had to deal with all of that as well as environmental issues. But we finally have. The PPG work closely with the practice and have a very good relationship with them. We give them our full support and will continue to do so.”

Launceston town mayor, Cllr Dave Gordon was pleased with the news, adding: “Naturally I am delighted that the improvements and extension to our medical centre is now underway, and we as a community look forward to seeing its completion in about 18 months time.

“The improvements will hopefully result in more doctors and practice nurses at the practice allowing residents easier access to a doctor.

“The previous and present practice managers along with members of the PPG have worked tirelessly over the years to make this project happen, and I am sure we all look forward to seeing the end result.”