Start date for £6.5m health centre

The new Glebefields Neighbourhood Health Centre in Tipton is set to transform an area once occupied by notorious council flats.

The building in St Marks Road will start going up in January. Work is expected to be complete by mid 2011.

The new development will provide facilities for a number of clinics, from foot health to family planning, as well as dental services, a Citizen's Advice Bureau, a pharmacy and an optician.

Practice nurses will have the facilities to provide specialised services for patients wanting to stop smoking, patients with diabetes and hypertension amongst many other services. The 33,000 sq ft health hub will replace the existing Glebefields Health Centre on land once occupied by the Glebefields estate's troubled blocks of flats, Jellicoe and Beatty House.

The new two-storey centre will serve 35,000 patients and include health services such as GP practices from the existing Glebefields Practice and the Swanpool Medical Centre.

The project is a joint initiative between Sandwell Primary Care Trust and developers Sandwell Local Improvement Finance Trust Company, which will build and maintain the centre for the PCT under a long term public private partnership agreement.

Jon Dicken, the PCT's deputy director of commissioning, said: "This is great news for the people of Tipton and continues the Primary Care Trust's plans for the development of services and facilities across Sandwell for the benefit of local people."

Sandwell's health boss, Councillor Derek Rowley, added: "We have worked closely with the PCT on this development and we are pleased to see this much-needed project coming to fruition on a prime site in Glebefields.

"We are delighted that a centre with a whole range of facilities will now be easily available for the benefit of the people of Tipton."