6 November 2018
The Shropshire and Mid Wales Fertility Centre will celebrate its move to a new state-of-the-art facility with an official opening on Saturday 10 November – when staff will be joined by families who have been helped by the service.
The centre, which is one of the top IVF clinics in the country, moved to the Severn Fields Health Village in Shrewsbury in June this year.
To mark the occasion, a plaque will be unveiled and a tree planted in the grounds of the health village on Saturday – and among the invited guests will be some of the couples who have had their dreams of being parents realised over the last 15 years.
Also attending will be Councillor Peter Nutting, Mayor of Shrewsbury and Leader of Shropshire Council; staff, past and present, from the Fertility Centre, along with staff from other work groups that assisted in the relocation.
The Shropshire and Mid Wales Fertility Centre first started delivering IVF in Shropshire in 2003 when the service, provided by The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH), was based at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital. However, as the service developed – it meant it outgrew its home.
The new facility is one of the most modern in the NHS. It is an NHS Assisted Conception Centre delivering the latest assisted conception methods and technology to both NHS and private patients. As well as IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation), that includes ICSI (Intra-cytoplasmic Sperm Injection), IUI (Intra-Uterine Insemination), Egg Donation and FET (Frozen Embryo Transfer).
The new department now consists of a larger secure admin area; an outpatient and diagnostics area, and a clinical hub which features state-of-the-art laboratories, treatment rooms and recovery area.
The centre has been designed by the multi-professional fertility team to provide scope for more advanced fertility treatments, such as pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, to be offered in the future; and also to further improve the centre’s success rates, which are already the highest in the West Midlands.
Jason Kasraie, Consultant Clinical Embryologist and Andrologist, and Head of Fertility Services at SaTH, said: “This new facility is almost double the size of our previous department at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and it gives us the space and the environment that we needed to move into the 21st century, which is really great news for our patients.
“We are all very much looking forward to the official opening as it will be a wonderful opportunity for staff to catch up again with some of the couples that we have been able to help over the years – although many often come back to see us.
“It also means that we can show our invited guests around our new premises and shine the spotlight on all the fantastic work that we do.”
Jonathan Murphy, CEO of Assura which manages the Severn Fields Health Village and which has helped with the official opening, said: “Severn Fields is a fantastic example of a community health building which is bringing together a range of health services under one roof. We’re delighted to have been able to play our part in helping the clinic find the fit-for-purpose space it needed for the next stage of its journey, and we wish the team all the best for their future at Severn Fields.”