SINGAPORE — Patients can expect better medical diagnosis and shorter waiting times for test results with the opening of a medical diagnostics and education facility by SingHealth, the largest healthcare group in Singapore.

The first of its kind in the region, Academia, a 13-storey twin-tower facility, will officially open this Saturday. Located in Outram, it boosts “cutting-edge” technology and facilities, such as automated systems and simulated wards for medical team-based and surgical procedural training, which will enable faster turnaround times for diagnosis, while allowing training to be conducted in a “realistic setting”, SingHealth said.

With a floor area of 75,000 sq m, it houses surgical skills facilities, and is “wired” to provide live streaming as well as recordings of training sessions, allowing healthcare professionals to share their knowledge with other SingHealth or overseas institutions.

The healthcare group oversees nine polyclinics, five national specialist centres and two hospitals — Singapore General Hospital (SGH) and KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital.

Construction of the S$360 million facility began in 2009, with the aim of providing “better care” for patients. “And better care must come from training better healthcare professionals,” said Professor London Lucien Ooi, Chairman, Division of Surgery, SGH and Director of SingHealth Transplant. “Training in a setting like this, in this protected and controlled environment, allows for better training. So the end product will be better trainees, doctors, nurses and therefore, a better outcome.”

The facility was originally intended to build up the SGH Department of Pathology and allow integration of the latest technology into laboratory processes to “further enhance test and diagnostic accuracy and reliability”, said Professor Ivy Ng, Group CEO of SingHealth. “As planning progressed, it became apparent that the building of Academia will present an excellent opportunity to create an environment where greater synergies can be harnessed from the convergence of pathology, research and education, and enable us to set new benchmarks,” she added.

A unique facility in Academia is the wet-skills lab, which allows medical students and doctors to train in a simulated “live” hospital setting. Previously, only six operating tables could be used for training at a time. Now, the lab has 48 such tables. With the increase, training can be provided for more people not just in Singapore but for the region, Dr Ooi said.