Mixed-sex wards in hospitals across the West Midlands today moved a step closer to abolition with the announcement of a £3 million Government payment.

The aim of the Department of Health cash is to ensure all the region’s hospitals have only single-sex wards by 2011. Walsall Hospitals NHS Trust will receive the biggest contribution in the Black Country and mid Staffordshire, with £1.2 million, while the Royal Wolverhampton Hospitals NHS Trust is getting £750,000 for 11 projects.

The money for Walsall will go on refurbishing two wards at the Manor Hospital, with each receiving five new bathrooms. As part of a pilot the number of patients on the wards will also be cut to give patients more privacy.

At New Cross Hospital in Wolverhampton, cash will be spent on changing the layout of some bays to include en-suite bathrooms, building additional toilets and bathrooms, and providing segregation screening.

Wolverhampton City Primary Care Trust will get £125,000 to install bathrooms in single-sex bays on two wards at West Park Rehabilitation Hospital.

Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust will receive £710,000 and its primary care trust is putting forward a further £150,000. In Sandwell, Rowley and City Hospitals the money will be used for partitions across the ends of bays so that beds are separated from ward corridors.

Sandwell Mental Health and Social Care NHS Foundation Trust will receive £296,000 to improve the 12-bed Heath Lane Hospital in West Bromwich.

Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation trust will get £100,000 for three schemes.