IPSWICH: The Star can today reveal ANOTHER boost for Ipswich Hospital – a multi-million pound investment in services at the trust.

A new sterilisation unit will be built at the Heath Road site after the Department of Health announced a �5million grant to improve services for patients in east Suffolk.

Another �5m has already been announced to fund the building of a specialist elective heart centre at the hospital – following a three-year campaign led by The Star, Heartbeat East Suffolk and Ipswich MP Ben Gummer.

And it comes as Star readers helped save an under threat specialist diabetes nurse facing redundancy and news that the hospital’s pioneering team of spinal surgeons is providing a nationally-acclaimed service at the trust.

The sterilisation unit will ensure that safe and clean instruments and medical devices are available to all surgeons and clinicians when performing operations and procedures on patients.

While the cleanliness of equipment at the hospital is not an issue the news means the service will be retained at the heart of the trust.

Ipswich MP Ben Gummer welcomed the announcement.

“This is very important news for the reason that they (health bosses) were thinking of centralising sterilisation services at a regional unit,” he said.

“Having it on site at Ipswich will reaffirm the hospital is going to remain and grow as a centre of surgery.

“It may seem technical but it is really important to have our own unit, giving the hospital their own sterilising capabilities.”

And medical director at the trust, Peter Donaldson said the new unit was a key back office service which is vital to frontline care.

“We are very pleased to have been awarded this funding,” he added. “The sterilisation services department is a great example of an essential clinical “back office” service which supports the frontline.

“Hospital surgeons and clinicians feel very strongly that on-site sterilisation is by far the safest option allowing the clinicians to put patient safety at the centre of everything we do.”

Ipswich Hospital is one of three major projects across the east of England as part of a �330m allocation to trusts nationally.

Health secretary Andrew Lansley said: “This will mean that more patients in Suffolk will benefit from the latest world class equipment.”

n What do you think of services at Ipswich Hospital? Write to health reporter Lizzie Parry, Ipswich Star, 30 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich, IP4 1AN or e-mail lizzie.parry@archant.co.uk