New CT scanner arrives at Telford's Princess Royal Hospital

A new CT scanner has arrived at the Princess Royal Hospital (PRH) in Telford which will help improve patient care and experience.

Alongside the new scanner is a newly-created three-bedded bay which will be used for patients waiting for a CT scan, allowing them more privacy.

The scanner and new bed bay are part of a £7 million investment in the Radiology department across The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH), which runs the PRH and the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.

The scanner was delivered to the X-ray Department at PRH on Tuesday night (12 November), and is expected to go live in December. It brings the number of scanners at PRH to two.

The additional scanner will help SaTH to ensure the sustainable and reliable delivery of emergency and urgent CT scanning, particularly for stroke and paediatric patients. Its superior technology will also allow for improved image quality and advanced imaging, such as cardiac.

Glen Whitehouse, Radiology Centre Manager at SaTH, said: “This is great news for our patients as the addition of a new scanner will greatly improve referral to scan time which in turn improves clinical prognosis.

“This is a high specification scanner which will also meet the demands of current growth in CT demand, and importantly for patients, it means they would not have to be transferred to another hospital site should the existing scanner at PRH break down or be unavailable due to scheduled maintenance.

“We have also created a new bed wait area opposite the scan room which will help to improve patient experience by giving them more privacy while they wait for their scans.”

A CT – computerised tomography – scan uses rotating x-rays and a computer to create detailed images of the inside of the body such as the internal organs, blood vessels and bones.