John Radcliffe Hospital

John Radcliffe Hospital stands on Headington Hill on the edge of Oxford. Its large white-tiled buildings overlook the city from the slope. The first block, JR1, opened in 1972 and holds women’s services and newborn care. The second, JR2 from 1979, is bigger and houses most specialist units. A later West Wing, finished in 2006, added the Oxford Children’s Hospital and relocated eye and neuroscience departments. The hospital is the main teaching site for Oxford University and Oxford Brookes University. It runs one of the UK’s leading Biomedical Research Centres, set up in 2007 with £114 million of funding. Nearby Oxford Health also received £12 million for research work. The Queen and Duke of Edinburgh opened the West Wing in 2008 after local supporters raised £15 million for the Children’s Hospital. A model Utahraptor from the Natural History Museum guards the entrance. Visitors see wide corridors and modern wards in JR1 and JR2. The West Wing contains bright children’s wards, eye clinics and brain-imaging rooms. Landscaping around the buildings keeps the hillside green. The hospital’s history is marked by names like John Radcliffe, an 18th-century physician, and by patients such as Roald Dahl, who died there in 1990.