Nottingham Queen's Medical Centre redevelopment plans include helipad
A new helipad could be built as part of a major redevelopment of a Nottingham hospital, an NHS trust has announced.
But it needs to raise £3m to fund the helipad, which would sit on top of a new multi-storey car park at the Queen's Medical Centre.
Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust said it had already received £5.5m from the government for the new Medipark research facility.
The car park will be built using £1.5m of the trust's own money.
Once grant money is secured, planning applications for the car park and Medipark will be lodged with Nottingham City Council.
'Saved 103 lives'
The helipad, which will support the East Midlands Trauma Centre on the hospital site, will reduce the transfer time from air ambulances to between two and three minutes, the trust said.
Currently helicopters have to land at the university, 20 minutes away.
After the helipad is built patients would be moved from the new helipad, along the hospital's private road network and into the emergency department.
Adam Brooks, clinical lead for the trauma centre, said that in the two years since it opened, it had saved 103 lives.
"We have got no evidence to say we have been losing people at all but we are very keen to move people into hospital even faster," he said.
'World of difference'
Medipark - planned to be part of the Nottingham Enterprise Zone - could create hundreds of jobs over 10 years, the trust said.
It successfully bid for £5.5m from the government and is now waiting for confirmation of a £2.5m grant from the D2N2 Local Enterprise Partnership.
Daniel Mortimer, the trust's director of workforce and strategy, said: "We think there are real benefits of attracting that research here to be co-located with the hospital."
The trust is selling off its existing Hooley Street car park to a developer. Mr Mortimer said the new 650-space multi-storey would increase the hospital's current parking capacity by 100, making "the world of difference" to patients.
The QMC will become the first hospital in the country with a tram stop when Nottingham's tram network extension is completed. There would be a new hospital entrance to allow access from the tram stop at the south of the site.
The developments - the hospital's biggest since it was built in 1977 - are planned to take place over the next 18 months.