Macclesfield Christie plans submitted

The NHS Trust has submitted plans for a radiotherapy centre at Macclesfield District Hospital in its first development outside Greater Manchester.

The £26m centre was announced last year and will be its third satellite site away from its main campus in Withington, with centres at Salford Royal and Royal Oldham Hospital already operational.

Designed by AFL Architects, the cancer unit will sit on part of the Millbrook Unit at Macclesfield General and will be linked to the main hospital building via a ground-floor corridor.

Facilities will include two linear accelerators for radiotherapy treatment; a CT scanner room; spaces for counselling, consultation, therapy, examination, workshops, and offices; space for staff research, and a chemotherapy treatment room.

The two-storey building will feature a curved brass façade with the patient stair and lift core, as well as the corridor link to the main hospital, clad in grey sandstone. The brass cladding is designed to match the appearance of The Christie’s main site in Withington.

If planning permission is granted, work is due to start this year with the aim of the building opening in summer 2021.

A spokesperson for The Christie said: A spokesperson for The Christie said: “If the new centre receives planning permission, it will transform cancer care in East Cheshire, providing Christie cancer care closer to home for more than 1,500 patients a year from areas of Cheshire, North Staffordshire and the High Peak are of Derbyshire.

“It will bring together essential cancer services into one purpose-built unit delivering local specialist access to radiotherapy, chemotherapy, holistic support and information services, outpatient care, palliative care and clinical trials. While some cancer care is currently available in Macclesfield, many patients travel to The Christie in Withington, South Manchester for their appointments.

“This can mean a journey time of two hours or more which puts tremendous pressure on patients and their families at an already stressful time. The vision for the new centre is that it will deliver more than 15,000 radiotherapy treatments every year with 18 treatment chairs to deliver more than 4,000 chemotherapy treatments a year.”

The investment forms part of an estates strategy for The Christie which will also see it build a 10-storey replacement for the fire-damaged Paterson Building in Withington.

The 270,000 sq ft cancer research centre, designed by BDP, is set to include more than 113,300 sq ft of laboratory and research space over four floors, along with 92,000 sq ft of consultant workspace.