hospital

The National Institute of Health has conducted an extensive study on the issue of operating room ventilation system and its effect on protection of the chirurgical site. A CFD code using a finite-volume code was validated with experimental data.

The quantitative determination of differential pressure and airflow for proper room pressurization is an HVAC design area that has not yet developed a standard rule.In this article current design guidelines and field practices for room pressurization are investigated. Practical field tests were performed in two types of facilities: a tuberculosis research lab and a cell transplant unit.

In surgical operating theatres the concentration of contaminants to a minumum level is compulsory so an optimum design of air conditioning is required along with careful control of flow and temperature characteristics to achieve sterile conditions. This paper aims at analysing the performance of the HVAC system design in an egyptian modern hospital.

A poor ventilation in buildings costs considerable amounts of money for hospitals and businesses.10 % of hospital acquired infections are directly due to an airborne route. The quantity and the quality of air supplied is important but also the way it is introduced into spaces. A change of the Wells Riley equation (establishing a link between the likelihood of infection, the infective agent production rate, the exposure time, the pulmonary and room ventilation rate) is proposed to take into account ventilation eefectiveness.

Construction in healthcare facilities is a major risk for airborne agents infecting immune compromised patients. Standard air quality analysis has included air sampling for airborne fungi. These culture data require weeks for transport, incubation and identification. During a demolition and construction of a new medical facility an infection control risk assessment(ICRA) determined pre-construction precautions and surveillance methods. The surveillance utilized real time air particle analysis and culture methods to determine relevant indicators of potential hazards.

This work concerns turbulence levels in a practical operating theatre of a 1200 beds Egyptian modern teaching hospital. The turbulence characteristics were represented by a modified k - epsilon model. Then a series of experimental investigations were preformed in the operating room to investigate the flow and temperature patterns and to assess the validity of the numerical model to be used.

Advances in infection control practices include improved operating room environment (airflow velocity, turbulence level, temperature, and relative humidity). Operating theatres are complex spaces. CFD modelling is a powerful tool to enhance the knowledge of the air characteristics. The 3DHVAC program was used to predict the performance of HVAC system design in operating theatres of a 1200-beds Egyptian modern teaching hospital.

A Norwegian research project in under progress to develop a new concept for control of air movements in protection isolates, operating theatres and other risk areas in hospitals. The aim is to reduce airborne hospital infections through appropriate design of building, HVAC installation and control of air movements. A container solution was developped for isolates. Its HVAC system, and especially the ventilation system are described in details. The first container has been finished in June 2002 to be tested.

The paper presents hygiene requirements to be met by hospital HVAC plants and analyses them critically for different type of rooms (confined rooms sterile protected, operating room, special areas). The tasks of comfort air conditioning are adapted to the improved indoor conditions of intelligent buildings. Air is only used for ventilating, whereas heated and cooled room surfaces generally serve for heating and cooling.

An audit of 20 hospital operating rooms was operated in Grece in order to collect information about the HVAC installations and the indoor physical parameters. Data were also collected from 560 medical personnel through a questionnaire about the assessment of the indoor conditions.