Scotland's largest private hospital is being bought for �37.5m by the government to help reduce waiting times for treatment.

Health Minister Malcolm Chisholm announced that the Scottish Executive wanted to make the HCI hospital in Clydebank into Scotland's "National Waiting Times Centre".

He said talks over the sale of the 540-bed hospital by its current owners, the Abu Dhabi Investment Company, were now at a "detailed" stage.

The British Medical Association in Scotland and the health services union, Unison, both welcomed the deal.

Mr Chisholm said the centre, which is to be given a new name in coming weeks, would work closely with cardiac centres across Scotland.

Hospital contents

52-bed acute facility Six operating theatres MRI/CT scanning On-site hotel for patients and relatives Space for expansion

It will also focus on reducing maximum waits for hip and knee replacement, cataract surgery, general surgery, plastic surgery and diagnostics.

About 10 consultants and more than 100 nurses are to be recruited.

The minister said the cost of building a 60,000sq. metre hospital, including equipment, would be four or five times as much as the �37.5m price tag.

Some 5,000 procedures will be carried out for patients with long waiting times in its first year, double its present private sector capacity.

Jobs at risk

The hospital was opened in 1994 as a specialist heart surgery centre, but has never made a profit.

Mr Chisholm told MSPs in the Scottish Parliament that without a change of ownership and direction, the hospital faced closure.

"The loss of this facility would be a major blow to the local economy of Clydebank and surrounding areas," he said.

Various types of surgery will be carried out

"It would also put the jobs of many healthcare professionals in jeopardy and could potentially remove a valuable source of additional capacity for the NHS."

A special health board is to be created to manage the centre and provide accountability.

Jim Devine, Scottish organiser of the health services union Unison, described it as "an absolute bargain, the sale of the century and Malcolm Chisholm should be congratulated".

Dr John Garner, chairman of the BMA in Scotland, said the purchase was a "creative move" to increase capacity within the NHS.

He added: "However, the executive must ensure that staff who work at this hospital will have terms and conditions commensurate with their colleagues in the health service, such as the superannuation scheme."

'Absolute farce'

The Scottish National Party's health spokeswoman, Nicola Sturgeon, welcomed the fact that the beds at HCI would now be within the NHS.

"New NHS beds are welcome wherever they come from," she said, "but it is an absolute farce that Labour are paying three-quarters of a million pounds per bed for HCI, when they have cut hundreds of beds across Scotland.

"Labour are robbing Peter to pay Paul with the purchase of HCI."

Hip and knee joints will be replaced

Mary Scanlon, the Scottish Tories health spokeswoman, accused the executive of "ideological tunnel vision", saying it could have been used by the NHS for sometime before now.

She added: "Patients do not care what sector they are treated in - all that matters to them is that they get the medical attention they need, when they need it."

Seen originally as a huge inward investment project, it was built with foreign money and government funds in the hope of creating a world-standard private hospital to be used by wealthy foreigners.

There was long-running controversy over the cost of clearing the industrial land to make way for the hospital.

After its opening in 1994 as a specialist heart surgery centre, the anticipated patient numbers at the hospital failed to materialise.

The overseas ownership changed hands shortly afterwards to investors in Abu Dhabi.

The hospital was employed earlier this year by the NHS to help cut waiting times.

The move was intended to enable 350 patients from two NHS trusts in Glasgow to undergo surgery, mainly heart or hip operations, by the end of March.