Minister for Health turns sod on Navan Primary Care Centre

The Minister for Health, Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, turned the sod this morning on the new Primary Care Centre for Navan, which will bring a wide range of health and community services together in one modern purpose-built facility for the first time.

Currently HSE services are spread across a range of buildings around the town and further afield and the new facility when opened will help improve access to care for local people and make it easier for patients and families to receive services closer to home.

Located at Balmoral on the Kells Road, the new Navan Primary Care Centre will be a landmark seven-storey development and will provide accommodation for a broad range of services, including GP out-of-hours, children’s disability, Child and Adolescent Mental Health, adult mental health, nursing, dental and orthodontic, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech and language therapy, and Enhanced Community Care teams.

The development is designed to meet the needs of a growing population in Navan and the wider Meath area.

At present, a number of these services are delivered from different locations across the town.

The new Navan Primary Care Centre will bring many of them together in one accessible location, improving the patient experience and supporting more joined-up care.

This investment is in line with national health policy and the ongoing delivery of Sláintecare, with a strong emphasis on strengthening services in the community and ensuring that people can access the right care, in the right place, at the right time. Primary care is intended to be the first point of contact for most people with the health service, with care increasingly provided in the community, outside of hospital settings.

The new Navan Primary Care Centre will also support more integrated service delivery by providing modern clinical accommodation for multidisciplinary teams. By locating a broad mix of services under one roof, it will make it easier for staff to work together and for patients to move between services in a more co-ordinated way.

The facility will include almost 74,000 square feet of HSE accommodation, along with additional space for GP and pharmacy services. It will also provide substantial parking and benefit from strong pedestrian, cycling and public transport access, reflecting its central location within Navan.

Speaking ahead of the announcement, Patrick Clerkin, IHA Manager for Louth Meath, said: “This is a major milestone for Navan and a very significant investment in local healthcare. The new Navan Primary Care Centre will bring together a wide range of essential services in one modern, high-quality facility and will make it easier for people to access care within their own community. It is a positive and important step in strengthening health services for Navan and the wider Meath area, both now and into the future.”

Minister for Health, Jennifer Carrol MacNeill TD said: “I am delighted to turn the sod for this landmark seven-storey Primary Care Centre in Navan, which will provide a wide range of integrated healthcare services for the people of Navan and the wider community in Meath.

"Navan is a town with a growing population, and this new centre will be a single point of access for primary and community care services for individuals as close to their own homes as possible when it is up and running.”

Fitzwilliam Group, led by local businessman William Smyth is the developer on the project. Some enabling works have commenced on site and full construction is expected to be under way by the end of the year. The estimated completion date for the project is the third quarter of 2028.

Speaking after the sod turning ceremony, Mr Smyth said it was a "proud" day and follows the recent opening of the bridge, which connects Balmoral to Blackwater Park.

"We just opened the bridge a month ago and that was a huge success. The amount of people using it is fantastic. It is going to make a huge difference to reducing the traffic flow into the centre of the town.

"The primary care centre which is going in there now is an 80,000sq ft building and is going to bring a lot of the services that are dispersed around different locations into the one building and one management so it should be much more efficient and again it is another proud day for Navan and the Fitzwilliam Group," said Mr Smyth.