Biological risk during healthcare facility renovation

Industrial Hygienists care about patients biological risk during the reconstruction or renovation of existing healthcare facilities. Control of construction related airborne pollutants is critical to balance occupant risk with the construction.

This issue grows more important when coupled with trends such as the increased age of patients; patients that are very ill and those with emerging infectious diseases. Indoor Air Quality risks in hospital are associated with more than 20 different micro-organisms, but the most dangerous is the Aspergillus that is critical to immuno-compromised patients, bone marrow transplant patients, patients treated for lymphoma and leukemia, patients receiving solid organ transplant and those undergoing cancer chemotherapy. The sources of construction-related contaminants range from demolition to water intrusion, to routine maintenance involving plumbing repair and ceiling tile replacement.

For all these reasons, the air of the environments where high risk patients are present should be regularly monitored by a microbiological air sampler like the portable instrument SAS SUPER 100 produced by international pbi.

The Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning System and the filters should also be regularly monitored and a very simple rule applied: "if indoor air samples have a bacterial count lower than outdoor controls, it is O.K.; if indoor air samples have a bacterial count greater that outdoor controls, there is a problem".

SAS SUPER 100 Air Sampler: A dedicated Application Note for Indoor Air Quality Monitoring in Healthcare Facilities is available on request from international pbi.