Harrogate Hospital Radio

Harrogate Hospital Radio (HHR) is a hospital radio station based in Harrogate hospital, North Yorkshire, England.

The station started broadcasting on Saturday, October 22, 1977, from a room next to the District Hospital’s telephone switchboard. In the early days shows went out just twice weekly for a total of 3 hours. The first studio had just one turntable, one microphone and one reel-to-reel tape recorder.

Before all hospital services were carried out from within the District Hospital, patients from the General and Royal Bath Hospitals were able to tune in to Harrogate Hospital Radio.

Thanks to a massive fundraising effort in the late 1990s, the station was able to leave their original studio and move to bigger and brighter premises.

The station now broadcasts 24 hours a day, every day on their own dedicated channel on the hospital's [http://www.patientline.co.uk Patientline] system. They now have two fully equipped studios for broadcasting, the newest of which being named the Vince Willis Studio after a much revered former presenter and chairman. Both studios and the central computer room are air-conditioned which makes them much more comfortable to work from. HHR have been successful with gaining awards at the [http://www.hbauk.co.uk Hospital Broadcasting Awards] . In 2006 the station collected three Silver awards in Speech, Special Event and Children’s Output and were Commended in Station Of The Year and Female Presenter. In 2007 they were Commended in the Station Of The Year section. And in 2008 they won two Silver awards in Station Of The Year and Best New Comer, as well as two Commendations for Male Presenter and a Commendation for Best Speech Package.

The station's future goals include involving Trust staff and patients more in their programmes via microphone requests, telephone links and broadcasting of local interest messages and stories and covering more local events and interview personalities; widening its range of programming, including children’s and religious output; continuing to improve their equipment and facilities to ensure quality output.

"Harrogate Hospital Radio is a Registered Charity, No. 507137"

External Links

* [http://www.freewebs.com/solidgoldsaturday/ Solid Gold Saturday website]
* [http://justgiving.com/hhr/ Support Harrogate Hospital Radio]