Thousands more Victorians with heart conditions will receive urgent heart assessment, treatment and care at the Royal Melbourne Hospital (RMH) every year thanks to a new cardiac catheter laboratory.

Acting Premier Jacinta Allan and Minister for Health Mary-Anne Thomas today officially opened the hospital’s third lab, which is funded by the Andrews Labor Government and the RMH Foundation.

Cardiac catheter laboratories – known as ‘cath labs’ – are used for lifesaving heart procedures such as stenting, angiography, inserting pacemakers and implantable defibrillators.

The new lab provides statewide care for lead extractions, adult congenital cardiac interventions and complex arrhythmia and offers tertiary cardiac care for most of regional Victoria. It will double the number of treatments and shorten the length of stay for patients.

The RMH is central to the Labor Government’s $5 – $6 billion health infrastructure project, which will see massive upgrades completed at the RMH and the Royal Women’s Hospital (RWH) and the construction of a brand-new medical precinct in the new suburb of Arden.

The new precinct will house new campuses for both RMH and RWH and deliver 1,800 new beds and treatment spaces to the Victorian health system.

The 12-year project, delivered across a number of phased stages, will create capacity for an additional 10,500 planned surgeries in eight new theatres at the RMH Arden campus, enable 1,000 more patients to get critical care across both RMH campuses, and provide for more than 2,500 more births at the RWH.

Upgrades at the RMH Parkville sites will refocus their facilities on emergency, trauma and acute care, while the new precinct in Arden will be a centre for planned surgery, outpatient treatment, clinical trials, rehabilitation and low-risk women’s healthcare services.