A new multimillion-pound critical care unit has opened in one of Kent's hospitals.

The 24-bed unit will benefit some of east Kent's sickest patients at the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford.

Funded by £14 million of national NHS investment, the new unit contains four separate six-bed treatment areas, each with two isolation rooms, and dedicated areas for family and visitors.

Plans for build – on a space that used to serve as a staff car park – were submitted on February 17, and approval was rushed through by March 31.

Tracey Fletcher, Chief Executive of East Kent Hospitals NHS University Trust, said that the design of the two-storey building had been shaped partly by the pandemic.

"The experience gained through the challenges of the Covid pandemic has enabled our clinical teams to design and help deliver an outstanding new critical care unit that will help us significantly improve care for our patients," she added.

The unit also includes a state-of-the-art simulation training suite, and dedicated rest areas, changing rooms and work spaces, on its second floor.

Dr Mark Snazelle, the Trust’s lead doctor for critical care, said it would be a "fantastic boost" for the team.

"It is the best possible environment for us to care for our most critically-ill patients," he added.

"After months of designing, planning, building, testing and training, we are ready for our first patients.”

Yvonne Davis, the hospital's longest-serving nurse, opened the new unit yesterday, 43 years after her first shift at the hospital on its opening night in 1979.

She said: “It’s been exciting to see the plans for the new unit develop and help get the unit ready to open.

"Critical care staff go the extra mile to care for their patients"

"I am so proud of the team and I can’t wait for my first shift on this fantastic new unit!”

Suzanne Folkard, 49, from Whitstable, spent three months in the care of the William Harvey’s critical care team in 2018 following a life-threatening illness.

Speaking at the unit’s opening, she said: “Critical care staff go the extra mile to care for their patients, which is something my family and I experienced when they were saving my life.

“Covid has highlighted their amazing hard work and dedication and I am so glad that with this new, larger unit, the team will be able to help more critically unwell patients, the way they did for me.”

The opening comes as long-awaited plans to transform hospital services in east Kent are set to finally go out to public consultation.

Councils and health chiefs in the county are examining the plans for a so-called 'super hospital' in Canterbury, which would see the A&E departments at the Harvey and the QEQM in Margate downgraded to urgent treatment centres – although locals would still use the hospitals for the majority of their care.