Works to repair damage to a mental health hospital ward which closed a year ago have finally been completed.

However, the Rollesby ward at Hellesdon Hospital is not set to re-open to patients until either June or July because the Trust does not have sufficient staff to run it.

The ward, which contains a psychiatric intensive care unit (PICU) was closed to patients in March 2021 after significant damage was done to it.

It had initially been anticipated that the repair work would cost £60,000 to complete, but after the project began bosses instead opted to take the opportunity to give the ward a full renovation - to the tune of £700,000.

The site's re-opening has been delayed a number of times, with various snags including Brexit-related supply issues holding the project up.

But at a meeting of the Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust's board, it was confirmed that the renovation project was now complete.

Diane Hull, the Trust's chief nurse, told members that while the renovation was complete, an immediate re-opening of the facility was not expected until the summer, with talks continuing over how it will be used.

Previously, it had been proposed to use the ward as a single-sex unit for women, with an equivalent unit in Ipswich being dedicated to men. And Ms Hull suggested this was very much still an option.

She said: "The ward will be open by the end of July or hopefully June and we have started advertising for staff [to work in it] We are pushing on with this model and the works are now complete.

"It will still be a PICU, but we are meeting to determine how we are going to use both of our PICUs to ensure the privacy and dignity of men and women.

"It will be for people who need more intensive interventions and cannot be cared for on acute wards."

Experts say having single-sex intensive care units allow for more effective care to be delivered, with mixed-sex facilities sometimes seen to exacerbate problems.

Meanwhile, it was also confirmed that the Dragonfly unit, a specialist facility for young people in Lowestoft, would soon begin a phased re-opening of its own.

Ms Hull said the unit would soon start accepting one additional patient per week as it re-opens.