Health chiefs are urging local people to use the minor injuries unit at Harold Wood wherever possible on Friday, due to a major new modernisation project at Oldchurch.

The casualty department at Oldchurch Hospital will be closed for most of the day as it moves to a temporary home on the Romford site during refurbishment work.

The minor injuries unit at Harold Wood Hospital is open from 10am to 6pm, hoping to take the load of the some of the minor bumps and scrapes.

For true casualty cases there will be extra staff on standby at King George Hospital in Barley Lane, Goodmayes, Ilford.

By the time Oldchurch A&E reopens it will have temporarily moved to the physiotherapy department.

It will remain at its temporary home, which is opposite the visitors' car park and close to the main hospital entrance on Waterloo Road, until at least the middle of November while the major modernisation work is completed at its normal site.

Tomorrow (Friday) it will be closed from 9am to 3pm to carry out the move. Ambulances will take patients needing emergency treatment to alternative hospitals during these hours.

The upgrade at Oldchurch follows the Health Trust's successful bid for cash from the Government. Improvements costing £748,000 are being made to the department in advance of the building of the new hospital.

Signs at Oldchurch will be changed to direct patients to the relocated unit elsewhere on the site when it reopens following the move.

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.