Eastern Health has embarked on an exciting journey of innovation - including leveraging public and industry partners with expertise in technology solutions in order to put Eastern Health at the forefront of health-care innovation. This strategy comes with a great level of executive support. During this session President and CEO David Diamond will talk about Eastern Health’s challenges as a large multi-site organization, spanning a widespread geography serving a diverse demographic. Part of the challenge is that Newfoundland has an aging population, and the birth rate is not keeping pace - leading to increased health and hospital expenditures per capita which are not sustainable. Eastern Health believes that these challenges present opportunities for leadership and innovation and have established key strategic private sector partnerships to ensure their success.

David Diamond will talk about the launch of Eastern’s Innovation Strategy which articulates a path to achieve their vision – one that positions them to leverage innovation to improve patient care and to elevate Eastern Health as a leader in the Canadian health sector. He will also discuss the importance of leveraging partnerships on this journey.

Michael Pringle of Honeywell will discuss one such partnership – a strategic collaboration between Honeywell & Eastern Health with the overarching goal of delivering comprehensive, value-based solutions to the healthcare organization. Of key concern to Eastern Health, was their aging infrastructure, rising costs and decreasing capital budgets. In October 2018, Eastern Health underwent a procurement process to identify and select a strategic partner to implement its Energy and Facility Renewal Program. By upgrading and retrofitting identified facilities and equipment across the eastern region, the program is helping Eastern Health conserve energy, reduce rising utility costs and decrease overall operational costs, while shrinking the organization’s environmental footprint by lowering emissions. As Eastern’s project partner, Honeywell replaced dated, less-efficient systems with technology that reduces electricity and fuel consumption, as well as maintenance costs. The Honeywell partnership surpassed traditional energy and required facility renewal measures, and also incorporated new and innovative UV technology in buildings Air Handling Units to achieve improved infection prevention & control. The project measures implemented improve the overall environment and comfort for patients.

The partnership between Honeywell & Eastern Health continues to push the envelope beyond the initial program as new and emerging challenges arise. Given the severity of the Covid-19 pandemic, Honeywell conducted healthy building audits at each hospital site to identify potential pandemic response solutions that will better protect patients, staff & visitors. During these audits, Honeywell explored and vetted a variety of in-house and third-party technology solutions which will be shared during the presentation.

HAI (Healthcare Acquired Infections) and SSI’s (Surgical Site infections) are a growing costly, concern within our Healthcare Facilities. The Impact of the environment is becoming more and more of a target of study and interest to manage the infection risk. In ORs, procedure rooms and ICUs, a more wholistic approach to analyzing and controlling environmental parameters is necessary to point to or even predict, in near real time, the increase in risk of microbial contamination inside and outside aseptic zones. A critical component to aseptic design in any procedure room is control of the airborne environment, including air flow direction, speed, temperature, humidity and air change rates, as well as microbial and particle contamination.

Additionally, current code compliant environmental parameters like; unidirectional, downward flow of dedicated air over the sterile field, (minimal blockages from lights and equipment booms) maintenance of proper room positive pressure, relative humidity, temperature, air velocity and air change rates are also essential to maintaining asepsis during procedure times). However, these environmental control methods are often focused over the sterile field leaving unprotected areas of the OR with uncontrolled, fluctuating, environmental parameters in zones with little or no air flow and increased risk for contamination.

This presentation will introduce a new partnered solution and concept of addressing the above conditions by correlating the relationship between the airborne environmental parameters and the potential for elevated contamination risk. In addition, we will share the results from a 3rd party, which tests a proposed engineering control solution that may improve outcomes by reducing the risk of wound site infections through improved environmental contamination control which optimizes procedure rooms and allows ICUs to be more safely used as procedure rooms when needed.

One in seven adult Canadians currently live with a disability: this number is expected to increase significantly over the next twenty years. StatsCan reports that 1 in 3 seniors have a disability and by 2035 over 9 million seniors will outnumber children 3:2. The “Silver Tsunami” is challenging the way we incorporate accessibility to account for a wide range disabilities.
With the government implementing national accessibility legislation through the Accessible Canada Act, accessibility is at the forefront of the conversation when building and improving hospitals and long term care facilities. We will review CSA B651-18 Accessible design for the built environment, which will set the backdrop for a deeper understanding of the role wayfinding plays in achieving our accessibility for everyone.

The goal of accessibility is inclusivity. There is no more crucial setting than healthcare to lead this initiative. With a focus on wayfinding as a key tenet of increased accessibility, Allison will illustrate how wayfinding helps to move visitors through a healthcare facility with confidence and efficiency, not only influencing how they perceive their experience, but ultimately improving the facility’s bottom line. We will learn how accessibility benefits all visitors and how the healthcare industry can be leaders in addressing the evolving priorities of the public.

Improving patient experiences, driving better operating results and enhancing clinical and operational staff experiences make up Siemens' vision for the future of healthcare. To execute that vision, Siemens is using IoT technologies along with new solutions and services to help create smart hospitals with cost effective approaches.

In this session, we will discuss a number of the approaches that can be used to create a smart hospital. One example that we will discuss is how a hospital used a renovation project as an opportunity to provide patients with the ability to control their environment. Working closely with the client and their nurse call vendor, Siemens provided an ability for patients to control HVAC, lighting and shades with the nurse call pillow speaker. This method was easy to install and simple for the patient to understand and use. Ongoing, the solution is one that is easily used by the clinical and facilities team – there wasn’t a totally new system deployed that they had to learn.

With this solution, the client was able to achieve their goal of giving patients control while keeping construction costs and ongoing expenses contained. Early feedback from patients and the clinical team is that the new solution has been well received and providing the expected benefits of improved patient experiences and reduced calls to clinical & facilities team members. In addition, the potential for reduced patient falls has been decreased due to patients not getting out of bed. All of this has been accomplished without adding major expenses to the project.
In addition to patient experience improvements, we will look at an example of how smart hospital capabilities were used to reduce operating costs. By leverage data, patient rooms are put into an energy saving mode when patients are discharged from the hospital resulting in operational savings. When patients arrive, the rooms are put into a mode that is comfortable for the patient. All of this is achieved using data without having to install additional equipment in patient rooms.

Our session will look at a variety of methods that can be used to improve the patient experience, reduce operating costs, simplify ongoing maintenance and reduce construction costs. Also, we will look at methods of engagement that provide an opportunity to achieve these results and reduce construction costs and risks. The focus of our session will be to demonstrate how you can cost effectively approach implementing a visionary smart hospital.

The concept of breaking the components of the project into tenders small enough that local contractors could be engaged added an aspect of Community Economic Development to the project. This was somewhat new to a gov’t department. The public sector is used to designing and building large projects. The firms that usually participate are well establish. They know and understand the Gov’t protocols. A whole series of new rules had to be created and shared with the industry in order for the smaller players to engage with this project. The local economic spin offs are gaining traction as the project moves forward. The net result is that not only is the infrastructure being renewed but the economy is receiving a boost as well.

A formal Heliport Management Program (HMP) was introduced to the Lower Mainland Health Organizations (LMHO) in 2012 to ensure standardization of safety procedures and systems across four distinct healthcare organizations.

Prior to HMP implementation, there were varying degrees of processes and procedures in place across the LMHO which resulted in the near closure of two heliports (at trauma/acute care centre facilities) and the imminent closure of one (at a regional healthcare centre in a high profile resort community). The implementation of the HMP prevented the closure of all three (3) heliports and increased the safety levels of clients and staff across all nine (9) LMHO heliports.

Through training, education, and other established processes and procedures, the Program ensures that our heliports are, and remain, open and operational by meeting or exceeding municipal, provincial, and federal regulatory requirements as well as international aviation safety standards.

The Lower Mainland Health Organizations (LMHO) Heliport Management Program (HMP) is constantly being evaluated by Transport Canada through regular and official Program Validation Inspections (PVI) and ad hoc inspections/visits to our heliports. To date, the LMHO heliports have been in compliance with Transport Canada’s regulatory requirements and our HMP has demonstrated “distinct improvement” since implementation.

By keeping all nine (9) heliports open and operational, the HMP provides our clinical departments with safe and rapid delivery of enhanced emergency medical services to and for our clients and the ability to deliver services as soon as possible to those clients that require urgent/emergency medical care and attention.

Hospitals are not immune to emergencies and disasters but patients, government entities and the public never expect a hospital to fail or stop operations. In recent years, hospitals have experienced disease outbreaks, tornadoes, floods, active shooter attacks and a host of other life-threatening incidents. In some cases, these emergencies and disasters force hospitals to temporarily abandon their main facilities and operate from temporary or alternative care locations. Hospitals must be resilient because, immediately after any disaster, the sick and injured will arrive at their front doorstep.

Given these threat and hazard landscape, its imperative that hospitals adopt a resiliency mindset. Communities across North America expect their hospitals to have the capability and skill set to anticipate and adapt to any situation, including disasters. Since hospitals cannot fail during an emergency or disaster, adopting and implementing a resilience program that identifies multiple response and recovery options is critically important. The first step in building a resiliency program is conducting annual threat and hazard vulnerability assessment.

A thorough, comprehensive hazard vulnerability assessment provides a hospital with an honest evaluation of its ability to effectively respond and recover from an emergency or disaster. A threat and hazard assessment must consider both the physical attributes of the hospital facility and the entire staff and patient environment. Therefore, Its quite important that hospitals consider both manmade threat and natural hazards to gain a wholistic view of its capabilities to remain operational during an emergency or disaster. Only focusing on natural disasters and disease outbreaks will leave a hospital quite susceptible to threats such as workplace violence, active assailant attack, civil unrest and criminal acts. All of these threats can disrupt business operations and inhibit a hospital’s ability to provide care to the most vulnerable members of its community.

This presentation will detail how hospitals and healthcare facilities can conduct threat and vulnerability assessments for new, existing and aging facilities. The value of conducting a threat and hazard vulnerability assessments prior the construction phase for new designs or rehabilitation projects will also be highlighted. Another key presentation focus will be teaching the audience how to translate the results of a threat and hazard assessment into more robust building designs, enhanced security measures, security technology investments and improved emergency response capabilities of hospital personnel. A special emphasis of this presentation will be how to leverage the threat and hazard results to prepare for and successfully respond to an emergency or disaster. Other key areas this presentation will address include the following:

• How aging facilities and out dated technology can exacerbate current threats and hazards
• How staffing levels can impact response and recovery outcomes
• How staff training programs can mitigate or worsen threat and hazard conditions

In essence, the best way to enrich the patient experience is to ensure that a hospital’s doors never close. Adopting a resilient mindset and instituting regular threat and hazard vulnerability assessments is a powerful preparedness tool that any hospital can adopt to protect its patients, staff and community.

Well times have changed, the venue has changed, the topics have changed and the climate is continuing to change. But experts gathering together, discussing challenges and dealing with those not so comfortable topics is needed more than ever. Come and join our panel of experts from coast to coast as we gather to discuss the subject of climate impact and resiliency in healthcare facility design. From the mega challenge facing our planet to individual efforts that help us meet these changing times head-on, our hot stove discussions are sure to give you improved insight into this important issue of our time. So pull up a comfy chair, get the hot beverage of choice, and cozy up to our fire for an inspiring discussion amongst experts.