The $82 million Hutt Hospital redevelopment has reached a significant milestone with the Government signing off on the preliminary design stage, the Health Minister, Tony Ryall said today.

"The preliminary design is the result of consultation with clinical staff and is a major step forward for people in the Hutt Valley and the lower North Island," Mr Ryall said.

The new facilities should be operating in late 2012.

Mr Ryall said, "At the end of this project, Hutt will have:

• increased the number of operating theatres, from four to eight
  
• a new emergency department with nearly three times the number of treatment spaces as the current department
  
• a new intensive care unit, able to cope with more complex patients
  
• a specialist acute assessment unit and a medical day procedures.

"The Hutt Valley DHB is looking forward to the future needs of its own community, as well as the lower North Island.

"Their planning shows that they are not only looking at bigger facilities, but also improving the way they do things in order to provide better services to people."

While this new capacity is being built, the DHB has designed and started construction on two innovative clip-on theatres to boost the number of elective services it can deliver. These "pods" will be commissioned in October, and will be relocatable.