Lok Nayak eyes new high with a 22-storey centre

New Delhi: Lok Nayak Hospital, one of the capital’s largest healthcare facilities run by Delhi government, is all set to attain new heights. It will be getting a 22-storey-high medicine, maternity and advanced paediatric centre. It will also be one of the city’s tallest hospital buildings.

“To improve healthcare facilities in the city, Delhi government has planned to upgrade many major hospitals run by it. The medicine, maternity and advanced paediatric centre is a part of this exercise,” said a Delhi government official. “The centre will be one of the best in the country. Though work had halted due to the Covid-19 outbreak, construction is expected to start in September,” he added.

Currently functioning as a dedicated Covid-19 hospital with 2,000 beds, it is arguably the biggest such facility in the country catering to not only patients from the nearby Walled City and central Delhi areas, but also from neighbouring states like Uttar Pradesh. The new centre would add 1,570 beds to the hospital’s current capacity.

The project, which has been planned at Rs 534 crore, is expected to be completed within two and a half years. It would have two basement levels and 22 storeys above the ground level. “The first to the seventh floors of the centre will have operation theatres, labour operation theatres, intensive care units and other facilities. The next five floors will have offices and space for common use. The wards will be from floors 12 to 22,” said the official.

While the entire hospital complex is spread over more than 90 acres, the new centre will come up on a plot measuring 4.3 acres. “The centre will come up where the hospital’s old OPD administration building once stood. That building has been demolished,” the official said. There would also be a multi-level parking with the capacity to accommodate up to 200 cars.

“The hospital used to witness a daily footfall of more than 7,000 patients before the pandemic. The new centre will help cater to more patients in the future. The new centre will have more ICU beds than the existing ones in the hospital. The total number of ICU beds will go up by three times. There will also be more than 40 operation theatres and separate OTs for labour,” the official said, adding that once the centre opened, it would have nearly 400 doctors and 1,500 nurses to take care of patients.

Earlier known as Irwin Hospital, Lok Nayak is one of the oldest hospitals in the city. Its newest block would also be one of the greenest. The block would be built completely on Green Building norms and is expected to get Green Rating for Integrated Habitat Assessment 3 rating, for which it would have to fulfill 34 criteria, including energy and water optimisation, sustainable building materials, waste management, sustainable site planning, etc.

The centre would have a sewage treatment plant with a capacity of 650 kilolitres per day. The treated effluent would be reused within the premises. Separate bins would also be provided for collection of different type of wastes and disposed off in an environment-friendly manner. The complex would also have extensive arrangements for rainwater harvesting.