RECENT NEWS

Members of the Institute’s Southern Branch visited the Portsmouth offices of Pall Medical, an IHEEM company affiliate, where they viewed its product range and listened to an excellent presentation on the benefits of point-of-use/terminal filters.

IHEEM’s Healthcare Estates Conference and Exhibition (1-2 November) will be a must-attend event for professionals in estate planning, facilities management and healthcare engineering.

An alert document relating to mobile heated food trolleys has been issued by the DH Estates and Facilities Directorate. The trolleys are from various manufacturers/suppliers, and the problem concerns damage which may occur to the electrical power plug with consequential electric shock injury. There is risk of death by electrocution, it is stated.

Alan Mosedale IEng FIHEEM has been elected to the Board of the Engineering Council UK.

A range of fabrics for use in hospitals which incorporate the BioCote anti-microbial surface treatment protection is now available from Mosaic Furnishings. These fabrics include cotton cubicle and window curtains, duvet covers, counterpanes and general upholstery.

IHEEM’s key role to assist Foundation Trusts and other Trusts in the significantly changing NHS landscape was underlined at the Institute’s recently held Annual General Meeting in London by Peter Wearmouth, who was retiring as President, and Richard Nugent, his successor in this office.

The annual gala dinner of the Healthcare Estates Conference and Exhibition took place at the Old Swan Hotel, Harrogate, on 6 November.

Paul Robbins, electro-medical services manager, technical support services, Papworth Hospital NHS Trust, was, at the Healthcare Estates Conference in Harrogate, presented with the Northcroft Silver Medal for his Health Estate Journal article "Managing risk in device engineering".

The new HTM 01 on disinfection and sterilisation is being published and is the first update of the guidance for over 10 years.

Designed for aspiring directors and senior managers, the Development Centre Programme supports the national Facilities Management Workforce Strategy.

In March 2007, the ETB will be working with the British Association for the Advancement of Science to expand the UK's National Science Week public engagement programme to become National Science and Engineering Week.

IHEEM membership manager Tammy Simmons left the Institute in December.

Patients in the West Midlands are to benefit from closer-to-home healthcare through the largest fleet of mobile medical units ever assembled in the UK.

Eric Wright Construction has won a contract to build a new faculty for the school of dentistry at the University of Central Lancashire.

Kier Northern has been awarded a £7.3 million design and build contract by Barnsley Primary Care Trust under the DoH Procure 21 Framework to provide a new adult acute mental health unit, which will be based at Kendray hospital.

The tenth anniversary of the National Biomedical and Clinical Engineering Conference was celebrated at the NEC in Birmingham with the theme "Convergence of Technologies - Past, Present and Future." The conference was sponsored by Philips Medical Systems, who mounted a display of historic equipment to mark the occasion. In addition, a new website (www.nationalbiomedconference.co.uk) was launched for the conference .

The British Standards Institution (BSI) has published its latest guide to medical electrical equipment.

The Tees Valley office of White Young Green (WYG), consultants to the built, natural and social environment, has been appointed to provide mechanical and electrical design engineering services on a £9m healthcare project at Middleton St George Hospital in Darlington, County Durham.

Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has reduced the cost of maintenance by installing Shire Systems' FrontLine Maintenance Management software.

IHS, which provides critical technical information and decision-support tools including an online service for construction professionals in the UK called The Construction Information Service, has announced that it has signed a sole partnership agreement with CIRIA, which provides performance improvement products and services for the UK construction industry.