Free hospital parking for cancer patients announced
All patients attending Kettering General Hospital (KGH) for cancer treatment will soon be eligible for free parking.
All patients attending Kettering General Hospital (KGH) for cancer treatment will soon be eligible for free parking.
This will bring KGH’s approach in line with the county’s other NHS Trust, Northampton General Hospital (NGH), where its cancer team already authorises free parking for people attending the site for cancer treatment.
Under the hospital-wide parking review, further changes to free or concessionary parking for parents of sick children staying on a ward overnight, blue badge holders and frequent visitors will be explored.
The University Hospitals of Northamptonshire Director of Estates, Facilities and Sustainability, Stuart Finn, said: “We have been reviewing car parking arrangements at Kettering and Northampton general hospitals and are aware that they currently differ.
“In the interests of fairness and uniformity we plan to update arrangements at Kettering General Hospital (KGH) in line with arrangements at Northampton General Hospital (NGH) from the end of March.
“While KGH has some concessions and free spaces for cancer patients already, the alignment will mean all cancer patients receive free car parking.
“We are also looking to align arrangements for blue badge parking, for the parents of children staying in hospital overnight, and for outpatients who attend hospital for an appointment at least 3 times within a month and for an overall period of at least 3 months.
“We also have arrangements for concessionary weekly parking tickets for frequent hospital attenders and longer stay inpatients.
“We hope this change will be welcomed by our community and ensure arrangements are very similar and easy to navigate whichever of our hospital sites patients and visitors need to use.”
This comes as KGH is currently seeking planning permission for a new seven-storey car park in preparation for future hospital developments. It will provide a capacity for an additional 662 vehicles on the premises, which will partly replace parking spaces that were lost during a previous rebuild at the site.
Kettering MP Rosie Wrighting said: “Given the regular appointments many cancer patients have, and that some will be unable to work, it can be costly to pay to park each time. After a constituent contacted me about this issue I raised it with Kettering General Hospital and I am pleased that they will now take the same approach to free parking as Northampton General Hospital.
“This will reduce the financial burden on local patients who are already going through a difficult time.”