Life-safety integration on a 600-bed hospital build

Client: Major UK healthcare organisation (anonymised at the client's request)

The brief

A new-build 600-bed regional hospital with the standard alarm-fatigue problem already designed-in: life-safety, clinical-equipment, BMS and HVAC alarms each presenting to their own console. The clinical-engineering team estimated operators were ignoring 40% of presented alarms by year two of operation in their existing estates.

Our scope

• Pre-handover alarm rationalisation pass with clinical leads in the room.
• Integration of life-safety state into BMS plant control — smoke-control, evacuation lighting, lift homing all coordinated through the iBMS.
• Operator workflow design for the three highest-frequency alarm patterns the operating team identified.
• Year-one operations support including quarterly rationalisation review.

Outcome

Presented alarm load reduced by 70% from naïve commissioning. Clinical-engineering and estates teams operating from one prioritised queue. Operating-year-one drag — the year of workarounds that usually attaches to a new hospital BMS — substantially absent.