A new, ‘state-of-the-art’ building at the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton has welcomed patients for the first time.

Eighty-five per cent of business leaders within the UK and Ireland’s healthcare sectors believe the ‘energy crisis’ will impact their organisation’s ability to meet emissions reduction plans, according to research published by Schneider Electric, the specialist in ‘the digital transformation’ of energy management and automation.

The University of Nottingham and water management company, Angel Guard, say they are set to 'revolutionise’ the world of plastics through the joint launch of a new polymer that they claim ‘could save thousands of lives’.

As ‘one of the building automation sector’s leading drivers of better female representation’, the Building Controls Industry Association’s (BCIA) Young Engineers Network (YEN) recently co-hosted the 'Together We Engineer' event – ‘a thought-provoking discussion on empowering women and the next generation’.

New research from Trinity College Dublin scientists strongly implies that heatwaves have a major influence on the spread of many diseases – and that many existing predictive models have overlooked this complexity.

Leading finance and accounting, digital, procurement, and workforce services provider, NHS Shared Business Services (NHS SBS), has launched its ‘second-generation’ Hard Facilities Management framework agreement.

Delabie will feature its ‘innovative’ direct flush system for toilets at Healthcare Estates 2022. The company said: “Toilets are an obvious source of harmful germs. The cistern poses a hygiene risk because water is stored at ambient temperatures in the presence of oxygen – ideal conditions for bacterial development.

NG Bailey has completed a £3 m services project at Royal Hallamshire Hospital (RHH) to provide four new operating theatres.

The project’s completion follows a series of healthcare sector successes for the firm, including project wins such as the new eye care centre at Golden Jubilee National Hospital in Clydebank, and the completion of the University Hospital of North Tees’ Energy Centre.

A National Audit Office (NAO) report published on 17 January reveals that the two PFI hospitals Carillion was building at the time of its collapse – the Royal Liverpool University Hospital, and the Midland Metropolitan Hospital – are currently due for completion over five years, and nearly four years late, respectively.

London’s ExCeL Centre will be used as an NHS ‘field hospital’ within days, with the capacity to hold up to 4,000 patients with the coronavirus, the Department of Health & Social Care has announced.

Recently incorporated UK-based company, KSG Health, has begun importing, and can now UK customers, a range of air purification devices from Finnish company, Genano.

BES, the specialist in design and construction of advanced environments for the pharmaceutical and healthcare sectors, has been appointed to fit out the new Vaccines Manufacturing Innovation Centre (VMIC) at the Harwell Campus in Oxfordshire.

To reduce the risk from healthcare-associated infections, hospital water systems must be managed in line with healthcare guidelines, and this extends to every aspect of the system, including showers and their fittings.

Croft Medical Centre is a modern GP practice in Chelmsley Wood by Birmingham. It is proof that a little attention to lighting design can go a long way towards a professional and comfortable ambiance in a medical practice.

The Christie’s new Proton Beam Therapy Centre in Manchester, due to treat its first patients next summer as the UK’s first NHS high-energy proton beam facility (see also pages 45-49), will be equipped with Varian’s ProBeam proton therapy system.

NHS Property Services (NHSPS) has launched a ‘vacant space handback scheme’ to help NHS commissioners cut the cost of empty space in their buildings.

UK building professionals should ‘take a leaf out of motor racing’s book’ to advance their use of digital technology, an industry roundtable has concluded.

The new government team led by Boris Johnson has ‘an unprecedented opportunity to dramatically shift policy on the built environment and deliver higher standards of safety, sustainability and social justice’, the Building Engineering Services Association (BESA) claims.

Imperial College London has opened its biggest new academic building in a generation, describing the £167 m Molecular Sciences Research Hub on the College’s White City Campus as ‘the UK’s most significant scientific development since the Francis Crick Institute, and the largest investment in a university building in 21st century London’.

Armitage Shanks, the expert washroom and bathroom solution manufacturer, has secured the national standardised sanitaryware and brassware specification for Spire Healthcare.

Spire was impressed by the company’s new clinical ceramic collection, Contour 21+, and its new line of healthcare fittings, Markwik 21+, with the ‘comprehensive brassware and ceramic basin ranges’ selected based on their ‘specific infection control capabilities’.