Clock View hospital complete

The £25m Clock View mental health hospital in Walton has been officially opened by developer Liverpool & Sefton Health Partnership and Mersey Care.

A joint venture between Farrans and Heron Bros built the hospital over the course of 18 months on the former site of Walton Hospital.

LSHP was set up under the NHS Local Improvement Finance Trust programme for the Liverpool and Sefton areas in 2004, to deliver new health facilities through a public private partnership.

Clock View is named after a local landmark clock tower which overlooks the site, and will provide therapeutic environments and approaches to care designed to improve recovery, wellbeing and reduce lengths of stay.

It will provide short-stay treatment for local people with a range of mental health issues including depression, anxiety and dementia, offering 85 individual bedrooms all with en-suite. The facility also includes a psychiatric intensive care unit for those most in distress and in need of urgent inpatient care.

Humphrey Claxton, chairman of LSHP said: "Since we started LSHP a little over ten years ago we have managed more than £120m of investment and developed 15 new health facilities in Liverpool and Sefton, of which Clock View is largest. The hospital sets a new standard for mental health care, designed to promote wellbeing, from the use of natural light, to the high standards of accommodation and secure outdoor areas.

"It has been a pleasure to work in close collaboration with Mersey Care to develop such a leading new facility, a facility which has given the local economy a huge boost, creating hundreds of jobs for local people, and acting as a catalyst for growth in North Liverpool."

Clock View will become fully operational by early March this year and replaces an existing adult mental health inpatient unit called Stoddart House, which will be handed back to Aintree University Hospital as part of the agreement to purchase the Walton site.