Mainly serving the unitary authority area of North Northamptonshire, it is managed by the Kettering General Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.

The hospital, which replaced a small local dispensary, was opened after a fund-raising campaign by the Hon.

[3] As part of a major redevelopment plan, a major new main ward block and Post-Graduate Education Centre were completed in 1976 and the new Rockingham Wing, for the treatment of maternity and gynecology patients, opened in 1977.

[3] The new Foundation Wing, which included children's and cardiac wards and a new intensive care unit, was completed in April 2013.

[4] In 2021 the hospital was said to have the ‘most cramped and limited emergency department in the UK’.