Publish date: 17 May 2021

UCL President & Provost Dr Michael Spence, Acting CEO of UCLH, Tim Jaggard, and construction partners ISG today broke ground at the new UCL centre for excellence for neuroscience as construction begins on this landmark facility.

The site on Grays Inn Road will provide an exceptional research and treatment environment to tackle neurological diseases like dementia, which are now the world’s leading cause of disability.The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, with its world-leading repution in care and treatment for people with neurological conditions, will have an outpatient and imaging service at the new facility. This will be co-located with UCL's Queen Square Institute of Neurology and the headquarters of the UK Dementia Research Institute, which is the single biggest investment the UK has ever made in dementia.

Clinical work and research will take place together within the new facility, enabling an active dialogue between individuals with neurological disorders, their doctors and researchers.

Tim Jaggard, acting chief executive at UCLH said “We are extremely proud to be working with UCL to create this centre of neuroscience. Co-locating clinical and research work will mean patients and their relatives will benefit from the very latest research and researchers will be better able to understand the reality of the conditions they research into, which is hugely motivating and can help shape the questions and issues which are explored”.

Professor Michael Spence, UCL President & Provost, said:

“This flagship facility will become a powerful tool in UCL’s quest to change discoveries into treatments for some of society’s most devastating diseases. By equipping the next generation of scientists and clinicians with the capability and technology they need to develop cures and treatments for neurological disorders, we hope to make diseases like dementia a thing of the past.”

The transformative scheme will provide:

• clinical care for local people with neurological diseases and as well as apprenticeships, work experience, mentoring schemes, an outreach programme and jobs for the local community;
• a £10 million boost to the local economy;
• National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery outpatient facility and an MRI scanning facility ;
• contributions to local transport, affordable housing and Community Partnership Plans with local charities and organisations.