Wellington's cash-strapped district health board is to spend about $1 million on a temporary upgrade of its children's hospital.
The Capital and Coast DHB was also told on Monday the hospital needs an urgent $9 million upgrade and eventually a new purpose-built facility will be needed.
The Wellington Children's Hospital opened in 1988 and provides paediatric services one level below that at Starship Children's Hospital in Auckland.
The hospital provides 55 beds in two wards in a separate building on the main hospital campus. There is also a separate out-patients area and children's wing in the new Emergency Department.
But board members were told the two-ward building has limitations and will be at the end of its life in five to eight years.
They agreed to spend up to $1 million on urgent upgrades of several different areas within the current Children's Hospital while studying long-term children's health needs for the wider region.
