Construction on track at the Victorian Heart Hospital

IMAGES: Artist’s impressions of the Victorian Heart Hospital are shown. We see the exterior and ground floor.

TEXT: Major construction is progressing on the new Victorian Heart Hospital. 

IMAGES: Professor Stephen Nicholls, Director of the Victorian Heart Hospital and Institute, appears onscreen. As he speaks, we are shown more artist’s impressions of the hospital.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: Heart disease is the leading cause of death in this country. One Australian dies every 12 minutes. It is our single biggest public health challenge. There is real opportunity to develop centres of excellence which not only manage the large volume of patients that we have with heart disease, but specialised centres that treat those individual forms of heart disease at a higher level of excellence – a dedicated facility completely about the prevention and treatment of heart disease in all of its forms.

IMAGES: The hospital building site is shown.

TEXT: The hospital will be operated by Monash Health and built on Monash University’s Clayton campus.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: We’re going to put a heart hospital on a university campus. It allows for us to not only do our standard research and teaching, but to be able to bring in colleagues from across the university campus.

IMAGES: A construction timelapse is shown.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: And I think that will enhance the work that they do, but it will enhance the way that we do our research and the way that we teach our students.

IMAGES: We are shown footage of heavy machinery in use and construction workers laying concrete.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: The fastest growing sector in the Australian community are those over the age of 70.

IMAGES: Cardiologists use equipment to monitor someone’s heart.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: And, so we will develop a dedicated cardio-geriatric program. There are heart complications of high-risk pregnancy, and so we’ll be able to continue to grow on the activity we do today to build systems from that approach.

IMAGES: We are shown a hospital room, then return to Professor Stephen Nicholls speaking.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: This is such an exciting project and it’s an exciting time in the project.

IMAGES: We are shown timelapse footage of construction, then cranes in operation.

Professor Stephen Nicholls: We now have a fully designed building. We have an enormous amount of work that’s already happening. We’ve dug down, and in the last couple of weeks we now have cranes on site. For me, cranes mean building. It means innovation. It means progress. This project now will start to come up off the ground into the sky, and then we’ll be able to start to realise this building over the next few years.

TEXT: Once complete, the hospital will provide lifesaving diagnosis and treatment for thousands of patients each year.
Professor Stephen Nicholls: It will be a beacon for the way that we treat heart disease.

TEXT: Due to be completed in 2022.

IMAGES: The screen transitions to blue. We see the Victorian Health and Human Services Building Authority logo, the web address vhhsba.vic.gov.au and the Victoria State Government logo.

End of transcript.