Eastwood Park Training’s healthcare fire safety expert, Paul Beech, an independent fire safety consultant, and managing director of Fagus Fire Safety Consultancy, raises concerns about the apparent lack of response in healthcare circles to changes in fire safety guidance. Here he focuses on the key changes to HTM 05-01 (2nd edn 2013) and HTM 05-02, the latter updated just over 12 months ago, for those responsible for fire safety in healthcare organisations.

Alan Daniels, technical director at specialist in self-test emergency lighting and exit signs, P4, describes the latest trends in, and requirements for, emergency lighting, ‘a vital part of the building services footprint in hospitals and healthcare premises’.

Like other communications technology, nurse call systems have evolved considerably over the past 10-15 years, and now offer far more than just their primary function.

Although LED lighting has its critics, a number of whom (see article ‘LED – panacea or marketing hype’, HEJ – February 2012) are concerned about what they claim are some manufacturers’ ‘exaggerated claims’ about lighting efficiency and lamp lifetime, Philips Lighting believes that, such are the advances being made in this innovative lighting technology, that LED’s overall share of the European lighting market will have risen from around 7% in 2008 to 25% by 2020 and that, a decade later, it will account for a remarkable 75% of lighting sales.

Daniela Sorana, an Italian architect, and the holder of a PhD in architecture technology, argues that, with university hospitals playing an increasing role in the development of innovative clinical practice and biomedical innovation.

While MRSA rates in England continue to fall, NHS Trusts are looking for smarter ways to achieve further reductions in infection rates, or to support their ‘zero-tolerance approaches’, and, according to the Copper Development Association (CDA), the not-for-profit, membership-based organisation which supports and promotes ‘the correct and efficient use of copper and its alloys’, deployment of antimicrobial copper touch surfaces is being adopted in many hospitals and other healthcare facilities worldwide as ‘an additional and cost-effective infection control measure’.

Getting new, and often heavy, medical equipment, such as MRI and CT scanners, into busy working hospitals, is often highly challenging – from a structural, mechanical, electrical, and logistical standpoint.

HEJ editor, Jonathan Baillie, reports on some of the key advances in large capital equipment for the operating theatre. Here, he discovered, major drivers include continuing growth in the use of laparoscopic and endoscopic surgery, increasing demand for the ability to share and stream ‘live’ audio and video footage of innovative surgical techniques to other locations to improve skills and boost training, and a general desire to improve efficiency, ergonomics, and patient flow.

Simon Corben, business development director at Capita Symonds’ Health team, examines how ‘clever use of zoning’ when planning new healthcare facilities could improve hospital design, increase inherent flexibility, and reduce lifetime costs, and argues that a ‘loose-fit, non-bespoke approach’ to space planning will lead to ‘more flexible buildings that are suitable for conversion to alternative uses’.

The Legionella Approved Code of Practice and guidance (ACoP) has recently undergone a review by the Health and Safety Executive. Steve Mount BSc (hons) CBiol MIBiol MWMSoc, an independent specialist consultant in water hygiene and safety, reports on the first conference (held in Birmingham) to discuss these changes, entitled ‘Legionella management: The revised ACoP (L8); what impact will the changes have on you?’.

On the 50th anniversary of the development of his ground-breaking hip replacement surgical technique, Amanda Parkin, communications consultant with clean air technology specialist, Howorth Air Technology, examines Professor Sir John Charnley’s influence on orthopaedic surgery.

A recent King’s Fund report, ‘Developing Supportive Design for People with Dementia’,1 describes the positive outcomes of 26 projects completed by 23 NHS Trusts across England under a Department of Health-funded programme, all of which set out to improve the care environment for people with dementia in hospital.

Independent venture capital investor, Albion Ventures, has sold Nelson House, a 32-bed ‘step down’ rehabilitation mental hospital in Gosport, to a joint venture formed by Care UK and Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust for £8m – reportedly the first transaction involving a joint venture between the NHS and a private healthcare provider to acquire a hospital.

Conor Ellis, sector head, Health UK, at built asset consultancy, EC Harris, discusses how NHS Trusts in England can adopt an estates strategy that not only sees available space optimally matched with future clinical need, but equally, to secure maximum ‘value’ from their existing estate, sees under-utilised, ageing, or simply no longer serviceable buildings, sold, or developed for ‘alternative use’.

As part of his closing speech at Healthcare Estates 2012, (see above), IHEEM’s new President, Greg Markham, introduced several new initiatives designed to raise the Institute’s profile, increase membership numbers, and ‘support members’.

According to Steve Pardy, a partner with consulting engineers, Zisman Bowyer & Partners, ‘the issue of full compliance is challenging NHS Trusts with finances under pressure and ageing assets’.

A new MRI and CT scanning unit at Winchester’s Royal Hampshire County Hospital, run by the Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, has been officially opened by the city’s MP, Steven Brine, having been completed in February by Brymor Contractors, under advice from TKL Architects, to replace a former imaging facility badly damaged by a fire in December 2011.

In the latest of a series of technical guidance articles to be published in HEJ this year, Tom Welland, conformance and regulatory affairs manager at fire safety product and system specialist, Fireco.

After reviewing its annual Awards last year, IHEEM has introduced two new awards for 2013 – for Sustainability and Marketing – both to be sponsored.

According to Stephen Lloyd, lead facilities management (FM) tutor at Gloucestershire-based training provider, Eastwood Park, ‘a combined 150 years’ invaluable estates experience has just disappeared from one hospital in the past month’, and, as many experienced healthcare estates personnel retire, and the sector struggles to attract replacements, the situation is being replicated in many hospitals UK-wide.