Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospital for Wales
PRIOR to the building of Phase One of the Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospital for Wales, children were treated in accommodation that was very outdated and in need of modernisation. The wards hadn’t been designed around children or parents’ needs and many were in a poor state of repair.
The charity’s founding members listened to the calls of leading paediatricians in Wales and began their commitment to the creation of The Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospital for Wales through a lobbying campaign spanning a decade.
“Listening to paediatricians at that time, they were incensed that Wales was the only country in Europe without a purpose-built hospital for sick children and understood that there was a pressing need for children to have a specialist purpose-built facility,” said Lyn Jones, president and founder trustee of Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospital for Wales.
The green light was finally given in 2000 to begin the fundraising for the build of Phase One and the Noah’s Ark Appeal was launched by then 14 year-old Charlotte Church who joined us when the hospital opened its doors on St David’s Day in 2005 to its very first patients. A year later, Catherine Zeta-Jones and her husband Michael Douglas officially opened the building and the world’s eyes were on Wales.
The Noah’s Ark Appeal became the most high profile and successful fundraising appeal in Wales, harnessing the support of children and adults alike from across the nation and beyond.
Since then, we have helped fund the teenage cancer trust unit, refurbished the adolescent unit and donated state-of-the-art-equipment to the paediatric ophthalmologic department making it one of the best in the UK.
In 2008, Phase Two was launched to raise millions of pounds for major projects such as the children’s operating theatres and a radiology department with an MRI scanner. On May 15, 2015, the hospital welcomed guests and members of the Press into the magnificent new building.
For the first time in Wales’s history, children could be treated for all their paediatric needs under one roof. This was a huge achievement for us and an incredible moment for everyone involved. At the charity, we are very proud to support the work of the hospital and its staff. Working together, we continue to improve the quality of care that children in Wales receive.