Innovative circuit breakers for Oxford’s largest hospital

Mike Porter, Business Development manager at electrical distribution and control specialist, Electrical Distribution Solutions, who has ‘a wealth of knowledge on switchgear’ gained throughout a lengthy electrical career, describes a project undertaken in very rapid time, with minimal disruption, at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital, to replace obsolete low voltage air circuit breakers with retrofit variants, which will significantly extend the life of the existing switchboard at a cost of under one-third of a new switchboard.

Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust provides a wide range of clinical and specialist services – which include cardiac, cancer, musculoskeletal and neurological rehabilitation, as well as medical education, training, and research. It says that ‘collaboration with the University of Oxford underpins the quality of the care we provide to patients’.  

As of the end of 2020 the Trust had 1,133 beds – which included 946 general and acute beds, 79 critical care beds, 18 for rehabilitation, and 90 for children. With 58 inpatient areas, 48 operating theatres, and 11,904 staff at that point, the Trust has over 1.5 million patient contacts annually, and serves the growing populations of Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, West Berkshire, Northamptonshire, and Wiltshire, although patients come from even further afield for specialist procedures.