Royal Victoria Hospital, Belfast

Royal Victoria Hospital
Belfast Trust
The hospital, between 1903 and 1914
Geography
Location	Belfast, Northern Ireland, United Kingdom
Organisation
Care system	Health and Social Care in Northern Ireland
Hospital type	District General
Affiliated university	1) Queen's University Belfast 2) University of Ulster
Services
Emergency department	Yes Accident & Emergency
History
Founded	1797; relocated 1799 & 1817; renamed 1847, 1875 & 1899; relocated 1903
Links
Website	Belfast Health and Social Care Trust
Lists	Hospitals in Northern Ireland

Coordinates: 54°35′38″N 5°57′11″W / 54.594°N 5.953°W / 54.594; -5.953

The Royal Victoria Hospital (commonly known as "the Royal", the "RVH" or "the Royal Belfast") is a hospital in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The hospital (which provides over 20 percent of the acute-care beds in Northern Ireland and treats half a million patients a year) is undergoing a £74 million refurbishing. This includes an extension to the Royal Belfast Hospital for Sick Children, new wards in the main hospital, a new accident and emergency department and a new maternity unit. The hospital has a Regional Virus Centre, which is one of the four laboratories in the United Kingdom on the WHO list of laboratories able to perform PCR for rapid diagnosis of influenza A (H1N1) virus infection in humans.

The Royal Victoria Hospital has its origins in a number of successive institutions, beginning in 1797 with The Belfast Fever Hospital and General Dispensary, located in Factory Row (although the dispensary originally opened in 1792). This moved to West Street in 1799, and then to Frederick Street in 1817. In 1847 the hospital separated from the General Dispensary and became the Belfast General Hospital. In 1875 it gained the royal charter, becoming the Belfast Royal Hospital, and in 1899 it was renamed the Royal Victoria Hospital. In 1903 it moved from Frederick Street to its present (Grosvenor Road) site.