The Plowright Surgery in Swaffham provides accommodation for 16 staff and four GPs. It is a two-storey building with a floor area of 762m2. The designers used a timber frame and low-energy, benign materials where possible. The surgery has large overhanging eaves to prevent overheating in summer, and it offers full accessibility for people using wheelchairs.

The surgery’s staff were consulted many times over the course of design. They helped to define the building’s layout and design details like the colour scheme. Staff also drafted an ‘Operational Needs Form’ describing their needs precisely.

Planning permission was granted for the surgery (located on an Eco-Park) and during the planning process, only all of the sustainable design ideas in the planning application were actually applied.  The surgery uses just 54 kWh of electricity and 90 kWh of gas per m2 per year, or 15.2 GJ/100m3, only a third of Department of Health new build targets.  This building is four times the size of the facility it replaces, meaning a much better standard of care for patients.

The Plowright Surgery has achieved an ‘excellent’ rating under NEAT, the NHS Environmental Assessment Tool, with a score of 77.2.  It also has better insulation than the Building Regulations required at the time, and high performance windows were imported from Denmark.

The total construction costs were £1.3 million (Q4 2003), or about 1706/m2. There was no cost premium for sustainability - a timber frame with full-fill insulation was cheaper than traditional weight-bearing masonry.  Maintenance costs are expected to be lower than usual, with external timber cladding and aluminium outers on the windows not requiring regular painting.

The Brierley Hill Health and Social Care Centre in Dudley is a clear example of joint working between the NHS, Local Authority and the private sector to use public sector service development as a catalyst for the regeneration of an area. This 13,000 sq m, £28 million, facility has been achieved through the LIFT Co securing Regional Development Agency funding to remediate an old industrial site that was in private sector ownership pre Financial close.

In St Helens the LIFTCo will soon begin work on a four thousand square metre health centre with retail and residential elements alongside GP and primary care services. Not only will this facility help to address historic health inequalities, it will improve roads, renovate shops and breath new life into a whole community.

The new £14.5m Mary Potter Centre in Hyson Green will soon be opening its doors to the public. Phase one of the development on Gregory Boulevard has now been completed at a cost of £9m, following 14 months of building work.

The joint access centre, the second in Nottingham city, is being developed by Greater Nottingham Local Improvement Finance Trust Company (LIFTCo) for Nottingham City Council and Nottingham Primary Care Trust (PCT) under a public private partnership agreement. When finished next year, it will house a range of Nottingham City Council, NHS, Nottingham City Homes and community services in one central location.

Health services will be the first to benefit from the state-of-the-art facilities, with three GP practices and primary care health teams moving from the outdated health centre on the same site over the next three weeks. The new building will be open for business from Monday 16 April.

The next stage of the development will see the old health centre demolished and the final part of the new building constructed in its place.  The new Acorn Resource Centre, a council facility for people with physical and sensory impairment will also be finished and the original Acorn Centre adjacent to it demolished to make way for car parking.

The Denaby Springwell Centre has been specially designed to provide improved services to cater for the multiple and complex health and social needs of residents of this ex-mining community.

A key outcome of the Denaby Springwell Centre has been to provide community access to enhanced library services, including the internet. As an area of high deprivation, and low educational attainment, it has been important to provide a Centre which provides health services (Primary Care Trust and GP) and opportunities for improving numeracy and literacy. The Centre also provides space for family services, including parent and baby classes and ante-natal sessions. The co-location of these services and the new community-based library is a great example of joined-up local regeneration.

The local Mayor, Martin Winter, said “This partnership working brings Council and Health services together under one roof to provide services for residents in the heart of their community. The brand new library provides a range of services where people can borrow a wide range of books, get DVDs and CDs out on loan and use the computers and internet for free.”

Community Solutions for Primary Care have developed the Vermuyden Centre in Thorne which services the needs of 15,300 patients and is a multiple and complex health and social care facility with services including:

• Two GP surgeries and other health services such as a sexual health clinic, minor surgery, a community pharmacy and a diagnostic suite
• Voluntary sector meetings
• Mental health services
• Full library service
• Welfare advice

The Vermuyden Centre provides a large, open plan office for the Doncaster Council’s Neighbourhood and Social Services team.  The first floor also houses Doncaster PCT’s outreach services (Community Nursing, District Nurses, School Nurses) and the two organisations have shared informal areas; including tea and coffee making facilities.  This has enabled extensive opportunity for joint working and collaboration between departments and agencies, particularly for services to vulnerable people, the young and the old.

Greater Nottingham LIFT Company has the £8.8m Clifton Cornerstone, the first of three planned multi-million pound joint access centres across Nottingham City. The three-storey facility serves approximately 25,000 residents of the surrounding area. It houses a variety of public sector services, providing a single point of access to health, social care, housing and council services and community information all under one roof in the heart of the Clifton estate. The keys were handed over in February last year and it was officially opened last August.

Clifton Cornerstone forms part of a wider strategy of Nottingham City Primary Care Trust and Nottingham City Council (both shareholders in Greater Nottingham LIFT company), to modernise facilities and improve customer service and access to information and services within communities.

The award winning St Peter’s Centre in Burnley is a combined leisure and primary care centre housed in one new building. It permits service re-provision and integration including the provision of services previously provided in the Acute Trust as well as integrated out of hours pharmacy provision. It also includes indoor leisure facilities for 90,000 people.

Strong partnership working between the PCT, Borough Council and Construction Partner has been especially beneficial in developing the design model and in determining issues of common concern such as parking and security. Sport England has contributed £1m to the scheme in recognition of the links between leisure and health provision.

The whole community has been engaged in the project– as it has been in the design and operational commissioning of the building itself. There was a dedicated patient involvement group which has evolved into a Volunteer group with members sitting on the Joint Building Management Group and contributing to the strategic management of both the health and sport elements of the building. This 10 storey building in the centre of Burnley is not only contributing to the health and well being of the people of Burnley but is making a major contribution to the physical regeneration of the town following some unhappy years of decline and poor publicity connected to social disturbances.