RECENT NEWS

Chloride, one of Europe’s leading suppliers of uninterruptible power supply systems (UPS) and services, has completed the acquisition of AES (Alternative Engineering Systems), which provides generator service and supply in the Republic of Ireland.

The deal to build Selby’s new community hospital and civic centre development has now been signed, with work scheduled to begin this month.

Ongoing carbon reduction initiatives, including audits of out-of-hours energy use, the establishment of a 10-strong energy champion team, and a successful Energy Week last September (HEJ – November 2009) all contributed to the Spire Tunbridge Wells Hospital’s winning of the Best Carbon Saving Award on behalf of Spire Healthcare as a whole at last month’s 2010 CIBSE Low Carbon Performance Awards, presented at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel.

“Ireland’s only complete event for FM professionals” is how the organisers of the Facilities Management Ireland conference and exhibition, which opens later this month at the RDS in Dublin, describe the two-day event.

Vanguard Healthcare Solutions is to provide London’s Moorfields Eye Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, with which its has worked since 2006, with a mobile operating theatre and ward until the end of this year

A range of former workhouse and sanatorium buildings dating back to the 1800s on an eight-acre Birkenhead site is to be replaced by a new £32 million, four-storey health centre, designed by architects One and to be built by VINCI Construction UK.

Chronic skills shortages will spell disaster for the UK’s construction and engineering sectors unless the Government accelerates young people’s training, chairman of training provider to the building services engineering sector JTL and Unite assistant general secretary Les Bayliss (pictured) warned during last month’s National Apprenticeship Week.

With the Carbon Reduction Commitment’s official introduction from the first of next month (see HEJ – February 2010), and carbon saving now high on the agenda for all healthcare estates personnel, the Institute is keen to draw members’ attention to a series of seminars it is staging this year, “Planning to achieve carbon reduction commitment targets for healthcare premises – practical information and guidance”, the first of which takes place this month.

Visiting IHEEM’s Portsmouth offices recently to gain a clearer understanding of the Institute’s role within the healthcare engineering and estate management sector, and its involvement with the International Federation of Hospital Engineering (IFHE),

CEO John Long has written to all voting members of the Institute to inform them that elections to the Council will be held in accordance with the Articles of Association.

A series of Institute seminars which will investigate recent developments in legislation covering risk management, and the implications for the way in which healthcare estates and facilities management personnel approach the issue, begins in May.

Organisations and individuals wishing to present a paper at this year’s Healthcare Estates conference in Manchester in October around the 2010 event theme “Cleaner, Leaner, Safer and Greener Environments for Quality Patient Care” are reminded that they must complete the required abstract registration form and submit an accompanying 500-word abstract to IHEEM events/education manager Jeff Pickering by 31 March.

IHEEM members who hold Authorised Person (AP) qualifications, and who act in AP capacity in a variety of disciplines within their Trust or company, now have a standard route to registration as Engineering Technician (Eng Tech).

Leading door manufacturer Kaba Door Systems has completed a series of unique automatic door installations for Colchester General Hospital.
Kaba supplied and installed 19 sets of bespoke automatic single sliding door packages as part of the hospital’s programme of continuous improvement of patient dignity and privacy.

Sodexo was recently named as the first company nationwide to secure Red Tractor Corporate Member status, signifying that, having demonstrated a responsible sourcing policy across all its operations, it is now a “wholly accredited” organisation.

A recent Care Quality Commission (CQC) follow-up visit to Basildon University Hospital, found to have “unacceptable cleaning standards” during a CQC inspection last October (HEJ – January 2010), found hygiene standards were now being met.

An eight-week Department of Health consultation on hospital parking charges in England, the findings of which Health Secretary Andy Burnham said would be used to develop “a clear set of principles which balance fairness with the financial pressures that hospitals will be under in the coming period”, ends on 23 February.

The St Francis Private Hospital and its associated nursing home, St Clair’s, both in Mullingar in County Westmeath, have demonstrated their confidence in the anti-microbial properties of copper by specifying copper door handles for extensive use throughout both facilities in a bid to reduce hospital-acquired infections.

A management team consisting of Adrian Parkin and Jim Liptrot has purchased the Howorth Air Technology business from PricewaterhouseCoopers. The company name remains Howorth Air Technology Ltd, with the business now privately owned and funded.

A recently published report from international engineering consultancy Parsons Brinckerhoff Powering the Future – mapping our low-carbon path to 2050, concludes that achieving an 80% reduction in CO2 emissions by 2050 will be “feasible but extraordinarily challenging”.