At a time when, due particularly to the difficult financial climate, many hospitals are undergoing upgrading and refurbishment, potentially affording an ideal opportunity to ensure that proper fire compartmentation measures are in place.
Due to the financial constraints being imposed upon the healthcare sector, there has been a greater shift in recent times towards carrying out remedial works to upgrade and maintain the existing portfolio of hospital premises throughout the UK, as opposed to building new hospitals. It has been recently highlighted that, in Scotland alone, around £1 billion will be required to target current NHS properties in relation to the maintenance of existing buildings to bring them up to current standards. Such upgrade works will inevitably have a direct impact upon the building components that are in place to protect occupants from fire. Such components include passive fire protection (PFP), which is an integral part of fire safety within a building. PFP attempts to contain fires, or slow the spread, through use of fire-resistant walls, floors, and doors (among other examples). Experience has shown that there are areas within many buildings where the passive fire protection provided requires some form of repair or remedial works.
General design principles
Within hospital buildings the maximum area of a compartment should not exceed 2,000 m2 in a multi-storey building, or 3,000 m2 in a single-storey building (in Scotland the maximum compartment size is 1,500 m2). Each compartment also has to be divided into at least two sub- compartments, with a maximum size of 750 m2. These maximum sizes are linked into the evacuation procedures adopted within hospitals.
Evacuation philosophy
In healthcare buildings, particularly in patient access areas, the immediate and total evacuation of the building in the event of fire may not be possible or desirable. Patients that have restricted mobility, patients who use wheelchairs, and those patients confined to beds, are unable to negotiate escape routes, and particularly stairways, unaided. Other nonambulant patients, such as those under medication, may also be reliant upon staff for assistance in evacuation. This is especially applicable to patients within high dependency units, where electrical and mechanical equipment are essential for their life support, and, as such, cannot be readily disconnected or moved rapidly without serious consequences. The principle of Progressive Horizontal Evacuation (PHE) adopted within hospitals is that of moving occupants from an area affected by fire through a fire-resisting barrier to an adjoining area on the same level. The aim is to protect the occupants from the immediate dangers of fire and smoke by providing an area of ‘refuge’. The occupants may remain there until the fire is dealt with, or await further evacuation to another similar adjoining area, or evacuation by way of the nearest stairway. Within current guidance there is an inherent reliance implied that the provision of fire separation will fulfil its function and, as such, it forms a critical life safety element within healthcare premises.
Drivers for refurbishment works
Existing hospital buildings are continually being upgraded and altered to accommodate such things as technological upgrades, consolidation of resources, and general maintenance practices that are required to address ageing equipment. WSP has been actively involved in PFP (also known as compartmentation) surveys for a number of NHS estates throughout the UK, and during these works it became evident that the fire protection issues within hospitals were no different from other building types, where remedial or repair works are typically required. Areas critical to fire compartmentation within hospitals are commonly breached without ensuring that the correct level of fire resistance is reinstated.
How breaches occur
One of the main causes of such breaches in fire protection/compartmentation is the lack of control over external contractors, and the work that they are carrying out. Knowledge and understanding of the importance of passive fire protection needs to be conveyed to contractors in order to ensure that any breaches are adequately rectified in an appropriate manner. Essential, yet basic reporting procedures can be used to identify any potential breaks in the building fabric that form the fire protection. This, however, is not exclusive to external contractors; consideration and training also need to be given to NHS staff to ensure that there is a sufficient knowledge base in place with regard to the location and type of fire-rated barriers, their function, and the importance of maintaining them to their intended level of fire rating. It is always beneficial to carry out a pre-works survey to establish compartment lines, sub-compartment lines, and the location of fire hazard rooms. This ensures that any penetrations in fire-rated construction can be identified, assessed, and managed, in order to keep track of any material alterations that may take place.
Need for an emphasis on fire safety management
It is important to ensure that a greater emphasis is placed on Fire Safety Management (FSM) within hospitals. The role that the NHS Fire Safety Officers provide is an invaluable resource to the NHS. However, their job requires the active and ongoing input and support of hospital management teams in order to demonstrate the importance of fire safety, and the potential consequences of not maintaining its various components. Identification (from either existing plans or using knowledge of building regulation requirements), and then surveying the condition of existing passive fire protection measures within healthcare premises can be a daunting task. However, the benefits that such information provides to the health authority are considerable when planning future maintenance schedules (targeting common issues) and budgets (targeting costs).
Establishing current condition
Due to the age of many hospitals, there will have been various alterations to the building fabric, ward, and department layouts, and changes in management. As a result, the records of any breaches in compartmentation, and the control over many aspects of fire protection, may be limited, with such things as hospital plans being out-of-date, and not truly reflective of current conditions. In order to establish the current condition of the building, specifically the compartmentation, it can, in many cases, be beneficial to carry out a ‘compartmentation survey’. By doing this, a detailed record of the location and condition of compartmentation can be established; penetrations recorded, and recommended rectification works carried out.
Providing a detailed ‘working document’
Undertaking a compartmentation survey, and recording details of the deficiencies, locations, and recommended actions, in a simple, clear, and accessible format, provides the NHS with a detailed record of any fire-related issues with the various elements of construction. From our experience this is then able to form the basis for a ‘working document’, that can be beneficial with costing exercises and planning for any rectification works. This can assist in focusing available resources to areas of high importance, as well as providing a comprehensive tracking system to record where upgrade works have been carried out, and for recording future works that may otherwise be overlooked (allowing further unprotected openings to occur).
Conclusions
In summary, good fire safety design of healthcare buildings requires a combination of passive (compartmentation and subcompartmentation by fire and smoke barriers, and the arrangement of these compartments to allow progressive horizontal evacuation) and active (automatic fire detection, automatic fire suppression, zoned smoke management, and evacuation lifts) fire safety provisions, alongside good management, training, and understanding of the buildings’ fire strategy. WSP has extensive experience within the healthcare sector, and of the challenges imposed by the refurbishment of existing buildings. By working closely with stakeholders, the company has developed an effective process to help clients control, manage, and document, any changes to the fire compartmentation within their buildings, and to ensure that the level of safety afforded to occupants is not compromised. Due to the nature of hospital evacuation, it is also clear that staff training (internal and external) will form an essential part of the fire strategy for healthcare buildings. This will include training for those that are in charge of commissioning refurbishments, those managing them, and the contractors that are carrying out the works, in order to ensure that they are aware both of the importance of the compartmentation, and the potential implications of not maintaining the required levels during refurbishment works.