RECENT NEWS

The annual gathering of like-minded individuals within healthcare engineering and estate management is nearly upon us once again, and I urge you to invest your time to attend IHEEM’s flagship event.

IHEEM is seeking candidates to contribute to its Specialist Engineering Advisory Group, which aims ‘to provide information and guidance for members, and advise on matters of special interest as they arise’, including via promoting and supporting the production of technical papers, which can be printed in HEJ.

Sunray Engineering’s ExcluLouvre is a LPCB securityrated stackable louvre system that has just received full SR3 security accreditation to LPS 1175 issue 7.

PHS Datashred, the confidential data destruction division of the £422 million PHS Group, has continued its national expansion by purchasing Bettershred, a ‘10-year old’, £250,000 turnover, Milton Keynes-based mobile document shredding business, with over 900 clients.

Synoptics Health Division has announced that Eastwood Park is to use its ProReveal test to detect proteins on surgical instruments, to complement training of sterile services professionals on how to assess the validity of decontamination processes.

Endoscopists training at Cardiff University’s Welsh Institute for Minimal Access Therapy (WIMAT) Endoscopy skills laboratory at University Hospital Llandough are to benefit from enhanced facilities.

Warrington-based In Depth Managed Services, a cleaning and FM specialist, has launched a dedicated healthcare cleaning division focusing on hospitals, dialysis centres, nursing and care homes, and dental surgeries.

Following some 20 years’ successful trading in Germany and mainland Europe, plastics media specialist, Hewitech, has set up a subsidiary, Hewitech UK, in Cheltenham, and plans local production soon.

Heat transfer specialist, Fulton, has moved to a new 43,000 ft2 Bristol-based UK headquarters, a ‘centre of excellence’ for its heat transfer products, which will provide comprehensive customer support – from applications advice to delivery – and accommodate a training/seminar facility.

Speaking at the Association of Healthcare Cleaning Professionals’ recent 2013 Annual Conference in Bolton.

Recent changes to EN54-20 legislation, and the introduction of next generation aspiration smoke detection ‘to provide earliest warning, accuracy, and flexibility’, are ‘just some of the aspects covered’ in a new CPD accredited presentation from Honeywell Life Safety.

A ‘tougher’ high-performance vinyl flooring for busy public areas has been launched by Gerflor.

Reaqua Systems, a business originally formed by Scottish Southern Energy to explore energy reduction and greywater reuse, and subsequently spun out under investment funding from Scottish Equity Partners and backed by Scottish Enterprise.

Britplas’s Safesee door, featuring an opaque panel which is quickly switchable to ‘clear’ to allow patient observation, and which is designed, as a whole, as a ‘programmable scale’ that enables staff to set a trigger point for notification of ligature attempts, has won a major international award.

Multi-disciplinary construction consultancy, Edmond Shipway, recently completed its work role as cost manager on the £6 million Phase 1 development of the Institute of Immunity, Infection and Transplantation, a new research facility for University College London and the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust, located at Hampstead’s Royal Free Hospital.

Provider of electronic fire and security solutions, ADT Fire & Security, has been selected as security provider for NHS Grampian’s new Aberdeen Emergency Care Centre.

P4 (FASTEL), the specialist manufacturer and supplier of self-testing emergency lighting systems, has further strengthened its sales team with the appointment of five ‘experienced and talented professionals’.

Marley Eternit says its Cedral Click is the UK’s first ‘innovative, low maintenance, fibre cement tongue and groove weatherboard’ and offers ‘a contemporary take on the traditional style of Cedral Weatherboard’.

With the NHS spending over £20 bn annually on goods and services – accounting for some 30% of each hospital’s operating costs – but, in the view of Health Minister, Dr Dan Poulter MP, the NHS still ‘failing to harness its enormous purchasing power’.

A ‘transition’ of ophthalmology services from Plymouth’s Royal Eye Infirmary (REI), Mutley, to Derriford Hospital, is now complete, following the reconfiguration and refurbishment of the Avon and Carey wards at Derriford Hospital.