From Monday 2 November to help improve the flow through our Urgent Treatment Centre (UTC) and Emergency Department (ED or also known as A&E) at Queen’s Hospital, the entrance will be moved and patients will enter via the atrium.

With the weather turning cold and rainy, our patients will be no doubt be glad of the benefit of waiting inside to be streamed.

The old ED entrance will no longer be in use and a split queuing system will be used into the atrium – barriers will split the queue from outside the doors with one for outpatients and visitors, and one for ED patients, so they will be kept separate from the moment they arrive.

Outpatients and visitors will continue to go through the thermal scanners as they currently do. Urgent and emergency care (UEC) patients will have a dedicated route on the opposite side and will go into the new streaming pods, where they will either be directed to the UTC (in Outpatients 1) or to the ED, or back to their GP or to a local pharmacist.

As always, teams from across our Trust have worked closely together to ensure national infection prevention and control guidelines continue to be met.

Signage for patients coming to the ED will be in place at various points so it is clear where the new entrance is located.

The drop-off point will also move. It will be located between the entrance to the multi-storey car park and the front of the hospital and will be clearly signposted.

The switch over will take place in the morning, between 6am and 10am; there will not be any disruption to patients who can continue to arrive as they would do, and will be supported in making sure they come to the right place.