June 11 2010
Laing O’Rourke has been announced in NSW Parliament as the successful contractor for a $69 million extension and upgrade to Nepean Hospital at Penrith, the major health care referral centre for greater western Sydney.
During recent months, Building NSW has completed an Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) process with NSW Health Infrastructure, providing construction cost and time analysis for the project.
Laing O’Rourke was subsequently awarded the contract to build new operating theatres, intensive care facilities, surgical wards and surgical outpatient clinics at Nepean – with NSW Premier Kristina Keneally and Health Minister Carmel Tebbutt announcing the contract win in Parliament and then visiting the site on 7 June.
Laing O’Rourke’s Executive General Manager Building NSW, Cathal O’Rourke, said the contract was the first major health project for the company’s New South Wales division since Laing O’Rourke began operations in Australia in 2004.
“Our collaborative front-end hospital development and design management skills, the knowledge gained from our UK health experience, combined with our construction delivery strength in Australia, gives us a real differentiated offering in this area,” Cathal said.
“We understand how hospitals work and the specific requirements of health clients, so we can work with them to deliver the right facilities with the minimum amount of disruption.”
Work commenced on site in early June, and when completed in mid-2012 will include:
- six additional operating theatres
- extra day only and extended day only beds
- two new purpose-built 30-bed surgical wards to replace older style existing wards
- purpose-built new surgical outpatient clinics to replace existing clinics
- new 12-bed intensive care pod including six additional ICU beds
- new 8-bed haemodialysis inpatient unit, with capacity to expand
