National University Hospital - History

History

NUH was originally known as the Kent Ridge Hospital according to its proposal as early as 1972, with a second plan drawn in 1975 by the then-University of Singapore Development Unit, when the hospital was planned at the Kent Ridge area, which actually costs $193 million to built, with an initial projection of 752 beds and a cost of $143 million. Construction began in 1980 and the entire project was completed at the end of 1984. NUH was the first privately-run Government-owned hospital under the owner and managed by Temasek Holdings.

NUH received its new staff on 15 January 1985 (on the same day itself, Kent Ridge Hospital was renamed to NUH) and opened to the public and received its first patients on 24 June 1985, with the opening of two departments namely the Department of Medicine and the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery. The hospital was officially opened on 17 June 1986 by Goh Chok Tong, then First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence. Prior to its opening, clinical training for the students of NUS were carried out at the Singapore General Hospital (SGH), where the university's medical school was located until it moved to the new NUS campus at Kent Ridge in 1986.

The hospital was originally owned by Temasek Holdings, a government investment holding company. It came under the Ministry of Health's Health Corporation of Singapore (HCS) in 1987. In 1990, the government decided to hand over the governance of the hospital to the National University of Singapore. This was in tune with the government's idea of making NUH the principal medical teaching institution of Singapore and a centre for medical excellence. In order to avoid duplication of expensive services, the government decided to make highly specialised units available at only two places; SGH and NUH. All other hospitals were to house general speciality departments only. Since NUH was too large a financial operation to be transferred entirely at one go, the hospital first reverted back to Temasek Holdings before being transferred to NUS in phases.

The move also brought in expansion plans and the hospital added in a 200 bed, seven-storey tower ward block, eight operating theatres and intensive care units over an area of 3.2 ha at a cost of S$100 million. Many areas of specialisation, sub-specialisation and facilities, such as the latest medical equipment, were introduced.

NUH was conferred the Joint Commission International (JCI) accreditation in August 2004 and the Singapore Service Class award in July 2004. It also received a triple ISO certification:

• ISO 9001 - 2000 (Quality Management System)
• ISO 14001 - 1996 (Environmental Management System)
• OHSAS 18001 - 1999 (Occupational Health & Safety Management System)

In August 2007, Minister for Health, Khaw Boon Wan, announced plans to build two new national centres at NUH to meet the growing need for heart and cancer treatments. MOH cited NUH's substantive expertise and experience in these specialty areas for its decision to open the national centres at NUH for these two top killers.

The National University Heart Centre, Singapore (NUHCS) announced its plans during a press conference on 2 December 2008 to improve its care and treatment for patients. This will be done by scoping patient care and the delivery of clinical services into four systematic, holistic and phased programmes:

• Heart failure programme: A model for disease management programme
• Congenital heart disease programme: Span-of-life care
• Acute coronary syndrome programme: timely help for heart attack patients
• Vascular medicine and therapy: saving limbs and prolonging life

Plans on the National University Cancer Institute, Singapore (NCIS) was announced in 2009.

In January 2008, NUH and the National University of Singapore's Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine and Faculty of Dentistry came together to form the National University Health System. This will help meet the healthcare needs as it brings about synergy that will be achieved from the integration of education, and clinical care.

To meet the increase and anticipated upward trend in healthcare demand, the infrastructure on the Kent Ridge campus will be developed to include extensive research and education facilities to be housed in the NUHS flagship Centre for Translational Medicine building, and two national centres for Cancer and Cardiovascular medicine at the NUH site.