Planning application submitted for Plymouth’s new Community Diagnostic Centre

Following a public consultation last month, a planning application for the city’s new Community Diagnostic Centre has been submitted to Plymouth City Council for approval.

The new centre in Plymouth’s West End will allow people to receive early tests and diagnosis. Ahead of this new building opening, a temporary CT scanner unit at Colin Campbell Court is already seeing 250 patients each week.

The new facility will reduce health inequities for those living in areas of greater deprivation in Plymouth and improve overall health outcomes.

CT scans involve a series of x-rays which allow Radiologists to detect disease or injury as early as possible. The benefits include reducing the need for exploratory surgeries, improving cancer diagnosis, and helping to determine treatment of injury, cardiac disease and stroke.

The permanent Community Diagnostic Centre will also offer MRI, x-ray, lung cancer screening, audiology, point of care testing and Physiological measurement tests such as ECG and EEG.

The immediate location of the proposed centre is in a highly deprived area of the city, and one of the most deprived wards in the country. People living in St Peter and the Waterfront ward have a life expectancy of 77 years, which is roughly 7.5 years less than the least deprived area in Plymouth.

The city centre has a mortality rate of 62.2 for cancer, CHD (coronary heart disease, COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) and stroke (rate per 10,000 population), and Stonehouse has a rate of 93 – the average across the city is much lower at 55.1.

If approved, it is hoped that construction will commence in 2024 and patients will benefit from this new facility in 2025.

Cabinet Member for Finance and City Centre Champion Councillor Mark Lowry said: “This is a huge step in the right direction, and we are working together on the longer-term plans so that the West End can get the health facilities the area so desperately needs. The hospital is already providing services to help people living nearby get tests more easily. It's been quite a journey, but we have a strong partnership, land that is shovel ready and the funding.”

Councillor Mary Aspinall, Cabinet Member for Health and Adult Social Care said: “Anything that makes it easier for people to get a diagnosis as early as possible has to be a good thing. The earlier people get diagnosed the better their chances of recovery or managing health issues.”