The organisation has been operating in Barcelona since the late 19th century and is on track to open its new hospital facility in 2023 which will bump up its inpatient capacity by almost 200 beds.
The Nou Hospital Evangèlic is one of Barcelona’s oldest hospitals. It dates back to 1879, when the city’s evangelical community opened a health centre for the Protestant Catalan and mainly Protestant foreign communities living in or passing through Barcelona. Notwithstanding the religious tolerance of the time, Evangelicals felt discriminated against in official hospitals which were always owned by Catholic religious orders. In its early years the hospital was based in a small rented flat until in 1893 it moved to a 2,000 square metre building in Camèlies Street in the Gràcia neighbourhood. It was here that the institution set up its hospital facility and which is still there today.
“There were very few hospitals at that time and resources were limited, yet the hospital provided quality care in an atmosphere of tolerance and respect,” says Gerard Urrutia, a member of the Board of Trustees. “The British and Central European influence of its founders really stood out.”
The hospital has seen it all. In the Spanish Civil War it was run by the American, British, German and Swiss embassies as the Foreign Communities Hospital. At that time it also operated as a Red Cross war hospital, a centre for refugee children and a food donation point. In 1973, the hospital regained its identity and over the following years it grew and rolled out new units and services.
After remodelling and choosing a new board of trustees, since 2007 it has been a social and health care centre with outsourcing services for the Catalan Government. At present the hospital has a capacity of 116 beds and every year hosts some 1,400 inpatients.
Meeting new needs
To continue meeting the local area’s social and health needs, the Nou Hospital Evangèlic has started to build a new intermediate care facility in Ciutat de Granada Street in Poblenou. This new hospital will cover 10,000 square metres and have 190 beds for elderly people in need of specialised geriatric care. It will also feature 25 day hospital places and a ground floor facility for particularly frail and complex outpatients, delivering care for the Sant Martí and Ciutat Vella districts.
“This is a major step forward in the city’s social and health care. The new site will double our number of beds and team of professionals. The Hospital needed a new functional, welcoming, healthy, open and innovative facility to continue providing quality care, and now we’ve finally got it,” comments Reyes Gualda, the Hospital’s manager. “There are lots of things we want to do: implement a flexible design for the varying needs of patients, get the facility ready to address potential upcoming pandemics, choose and invest in the right technology for future growth and keep on using energy efficiently. Plus one of the main challenges will be recruiting staff at a time when there is a structural shortage of nurses and doctors.”
To finance the construction of the new centre, the Nou Hospital Evangèlic has been supported by the Institut Català de Finances (ICF) in line with its commitment to fostering projects which have a constructive impact on society.
“The investment comes to around €17 million,” notes Reyes Gualda. “To ensure the plan was viable, we sold the Hospital in Camèlies Street and asked banks for the rest of the funding. The ICF has had faith in us right from the outset and we are very grateful. Its backing means this project will see the light of day and make it easier for the more than 2,600 people living in south Barcelona who need to go into hospital to do so close to their homes. At present the area has a real shortage of this type of amenity.”
The new facility is scheduled to begin delivering services to the public in 2023.