Huddersfield Royal Infirmary: Opening date for new A&E for Dewsbury, Batley and Spen residents revealed after eight-month delay

The “world-class” emergency department at Huddersfield Royal Infirmary (HRI) was due to open at the beginning of October and all appeared to be going to plan, with a public open day being held in September.

But a problem with the water pipework forced the original opening date to be abandoned.

The latest meeting of the Calderdale and Kirklees Joint Health Scrutiny Committee heard an update from consultant in emergency medicine Mark Davis.

He told the meeting: “A lot of remedial work has been going on between our construction partner IHP and our estates team, particularly on the water system in the new A&E, and that’s had a positive impact.

“We’ve replaced the jointing compounds that we found was not appropriate to be used so that’s been removed and a significant amount of pipework has been removed as part of that and replaced.

"We’ve got a little bit of work left to do on some of the taps and then we’re going to need to do some more testing after that.

“We’re also conscious that it’s now some time since we first went through the starting points of our transition plan so we’ll need to revisit some of that plan.

"We anticipate approximately five to six weeks planning for an opening because we need to refamiliarise staff with the building and get rotas and things up and running for double running as we plan over the transition period.

“At the moment, we are planning to open some time between the middle of May and early June, which is a positive step forward from where we’ve been previously.”

The new A&E comes as a part of a wider £197m re-configuration of the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust’s services at Calderdale Royal Hospital (CRH) and HRI. Under the plans, each hospital will have different priorities.

All blue-light emergency ambulances are to be received by CRH, where critical care, emergency surgery, and paediatric surgery will also be provided.

HRI will focus on planned surgery and physician-led inpatient care. Both hospitals will provide 24/7 A&E services and urgent care.