Trust Profile

Dorset County Hospital was established in 1991 as part of a long–term project to bring together all the local services for acutely ill patients onto one hospital site. The new hospital, just outside Dorchester town centre, was completed in 1997.

We were awarded Foundation Trust status in June 2007.

Our busy, modern hospital provides a full range of district general services, including an accident and emergency department, and links with satellite units in five community hospitals.

We are the main provider of acute hospital services to a population of around 210,000, living within Weymouth and Portland, West Dorset, North Dorset and Purbeck. We also provide renal services for patients throughout Dorset and, from next year, South Somerset; a total population of 850,000. We will also be opening a new haemodialysis unit in Poole from September 2007.

Our 3,000 staff work in GP surgeries, schools, residential homes and people’s own homes as well as Dorset County Hospital and the community hospitals.

In 2006–07 we saw:

• 35,061 people in the Accident and Emergency Department and another 14,057 patients in the Weymouth Minor Injuries Unit;
• 26,766 planned inpatient admissions;
• 244,551 outpatient appointments.

Dorset County Hospital has approximately 400 beds, seven main theatres, two day theaters and has been designed with a major commitment to Public Arts in Hospital. Related services are grouped into 3 connected wings: North, South and East. Entry to the hospital is gained via 9 main entrances and details of the layout can be found within each wing.

Work is complete on a £2m cardiac unit that provide services such as cardiac catheterisation, which means that patients no longer have to be transferred to Southampton for this procedure. Improvements have also been made to the environment in Hardy Ward, the Stroke Unit.