NNUH - Our vision Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals
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Our history 1900 – present day

  • 1904 X-ray department opened
  • 1904 (Jun) First Electrotherapist hired – supervised x-ray diagnosis/treatment, treatment by electricity & allied therapy
  • 1907 Dr Arthur Greene becomes first surgeon in Norwich to practice solely in Ophthalmic Surgery
  • 1908 Pathological department established by Dr GPC Claridge (curator of the hospital museum)
  • 1909 Admiralty requested 5 trained nurses to be sent to Naval hospitals in event of a war
  • 1910 Dr Claridge appointed to honorary medical staff as first Pathologist and Bacteriologist
  • 1912 ENT department founded by Mr E W Everett (Assistant Surgeon)

Nurses on Gannon Ward in the Jenny Lind Children’s Hospital in 1913.

  • 1914 (Dec) 11 trained staff serving with forces
  • 1914 (Oct) NNH becomes a military base hospital receiving convoys from France. This continues until end of WW1
  • 1919 (May) Nursing home for ‘uncomplicated midwifery cases’ opened by City Corporation. NNH agrees to admit abnormal cases for cost of 8s per day.
  • 1919 A centre of the College of Nursing opens in Norwich
  • 1919 60 beds set aside for discharged servicemen under care of the Ministry of Pensions
  • 1920 NNH recognised as an orthopaedic centre by Ministry of Pensions
  • 1922 A sister tutor was appointed
  • 1924 First government examinations held by General Nursing Council-Norwich was a selected centre
  • 1924 (Dec) Fundraising appeal launched to raise £60,000 for update of hospital
  • 1925 (Jan) Foundation stone of new children’s block laid by HRH Prince Henry
  • 1926 (Jan) New children’s block opened by Mr Simpson (who donated funds towards the building)
  • 1929 Reported that 20 maternity beds and a resident medical officer are needed to meet demand. No funds available for a new building.
  • 1930 Building of new Ophthalmic and ENT wards completed
  • 1930 Norfolk and Norwich old Nurses League founded
  • 1932 Outpatients clinic for Orthopaedics started by Mr HA Brittain
  • 1933 Preliminary nurse training school started, training cohorts of 12 every 3 months.
  • 1935 Orthopaedic department founded by Mr HA Brittain with Mr McKee as Registrar
  • 1935 Mr Bulman becomes specialist in Obstetrics and Gynaecology
  • 1935 New maternity block funded by parents of Captain Geoffrey Colman

Theatre Sister in 1957

  • 1978 The Sir Thomas Browne Library named by Philip Roberts, Clinical Tutor
  • 1996 (Nov) Bertram Diabetes Unit opens at West Norwich Hospital
  • 1999 (Aug) Work starts on £30000 refurbishment of wards at Cromer Hospital
  • 1999 (Oct) NHS Executive announced that the hospital site was to be sold for redevelopment
  • 2001 (Nov) New hospital at Colney Lane becomes operational
  • 1997 (Jul) First Bone Marrow transplant takes place at NNUH
  • 1998 (Jan) (11/01/98) Tony Blair announces that the new N&N PFI will go ahead
  • 2002 (Sep) First 100 medical undergraduates from UEA school of Medicine, Health Policy and Practice begin training at the hospital
  • 2003 (Sep) Colney Centre officially opens
  • 2001 (Jan) NNH officially becomes a University hospital Trust
  • 2004 (Feb) Queen Elizabeth II officially opens the new hospital
  • 2006 (Feb) New UEA school of Nursing and Midwifery opens on the hospital campus
  • 2005 (Oct) The Radiology Academy opens (one of 3 in the UK)
  • 2006 (May) The Big C Centre opens at NNUH
  • 2008 (May) N&N Hospital and Cromer Hospital become the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
  • 2011 (Nov) Opening of the new Midwifery-Led Birthing Unit to offer women a more relaxed environment for giving birth
  • 2013 (Oct) The Delivery Suite expanded and refurbished with all en-suite rooms
  • 2014 (Dec) A £19 million medical research centre  – The Bob Champion Research & Education Building – opens housing researchers, a bio-bank facility to store DNA and tissue samples, as well as undergraduate and postgraduate education facilities.
  • 2016 (Feb) Eye clinic services were expanded when the Central Norwich Eye Clinic opened near the site of the old N&N
  • 2016 (May) A £1 million robot is used to carry out prostate cancer surgery
  • 2017 (Nov) N&N Hospital becomes the first in East Anglia to carry out robotic colorectal cancer surgery
  • 2017 (Dec) The UK’s first Older People’s Emergency Department opens at the N&N treating the over 80s
  • 2018 (Jan) Expansion of the Children’s Emergency Department
  • 2018 (Feb) Expansion of the critical care complex takes place
  • 2018 (Sep) The Quadram Institute opened alongside the N&N Hospital site with the largest endoscopy centre in Europe
  • 2018 (Dec) first High-Dose Rate prostate cancer brachytherapy treatment in East Anglia has taken place at the N&N Hospital
  • 2020 (Aug) New ward block opened
  • 2020 (Sep) New Norfolk Centre for Interventional Radiology opened