FRIMLEY Park Hospital has been granted permission to build a temporary MRI and CT scanning unit.

The single-storey building will be built between the medical records centre and the post-graduate education centre on the hospital grounds and is part of the Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust’s “wider proposals” for the site.

The plans include the removal of a number of trees, but Surrey Heath Borough Council’s arboricultural officer did not object to the application as the “need for the facility outweighs the loss”.

The temporary building will only be there for three years while more plans and ideas are pulled together.

A statement from the trust said: “The temporary scanning facility forms part of our wider proposals for a new diagnostic and inpatient facility at Frimley Park Hospital.

“These proposals are at an early stage and remain subject to full business case approval from our board and planning consent.

“The temporary facility would house new MRI and CT scanners for a limited period while our proposals are developed.”

Frimley Health’s chief executive, Neil Dardis, who took over the post in March this year, recently presented his vision for the future of the trust after meeting nearly 3,000 staff members.

These include improving “capacity and flow”, reducing the amount of meetings held by 30 per cent, introducing a Dragon’s Den-style bidding pool for departments and celebrating the work of staff including giving all workers an extra day’s leave on their birthday in 2018/19 as part of acknowledging the NHS’s 70th anniversary.Patients from Haslemere and other parts of Waverley and south west Surrey who suffer suspected strokes have been taken to the Camberley hospital – rather than Guildford’s Royal Surrey County Hospital, after services were transferred to the Hampshire hospital since January 2017.Many Haslemere residents objected that adding a longer journey to the average 30-minute wait for a South East Coast Ambulance (SECAmb) to arrive, would endanger the lives of stroke victims.