The UK’s first NHS National Rehabilitation Centre (NRC) has opened after the landmark project was completed with legal support from Browne Jacobson. 

The UK and Ireland law firm’s real estate team has advised Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUH) on the £107m scheme since 2019, helping to deliver world-class infrastructure that brings together research, innovation, education and training alongside clinical practice to drive the highest standards of rehabilitative care. 

The purpose-built, 70-bed centre, which is co-located with the Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre on the Stanford Hall Rehabilitation Estate in Stanford-on-Soar, near Loughborough, opened in September. 

Equipped with modern technology, the most comprehensive robotics suite in the NHS and the first 360-degree hoist in the UK, it gives patients earlier access and more intensive treatments to help them regain their ability following serious illness or injury. 

Operated and staffed by NUH, the centre was funded by the UK Government’s New Hospital Programme and is the NHS’s first single-site operationally carbon neutral building. 

Victoria Thourgood, Partner who heads up Browne Jacobson’s health, social care and life sciences real estate team, led the firm’s advice to NUH in completing the lease of the site.

She said: “After many years of working on this project, this is a proud moment to see the NRC open its doors. This is a genuinely ground-breaking facility for the NHS, and it has been a privilege to support NUH in bringing this vision to life.

“Projects of this scale bring a genuine opportunity to tackle some of society’s biggest issues but come with a level of complexity that requires sustained commitment. The NRC will make a real and lasting difference to patients across the country, while giving the UK a global platform for cutting-edge rehabilitative care.”

The concept of establishing Defence and National Rehabilitation centres on a single site was that of the late 6th Duke of Westminster back in 2009, who purchased the Stanford Hall Rehabilitation Estate for the purpose. At the same time, the Black Stork Charity was specifically created to achieve the overall concept – not least by means of a successful funding campaign to raise the necessary £300m to create the defence establishment and enable the national one.

The long-term ambition for the NRC is to be the national 'hub' in a future 'hub and spoke' model, with regional rehabilitation units established across the country to widen impact and benefit as many patients as possible. The NRC will also lead rehabilitation research and innovation, as well as providing training and education through an NRC Academy.

Browne Jacobson’s health, social care and life sciences real estate team works with operators in later living, supported living, learning and disability, private healthcare, public sector and NHS estates, primary and acute care, dentists and pharmacies.