A small fire breaks out in a hospital’s outpatient wing. Immediately the fire alarm system kicks into action. The hospital engineering staff is alerted to the activated device location, the fire department is called, and an audible chime strobe informs the public. Meanwhile, in the ambulatory care’s private mode area, nurses are notified via the chime strobe and an alarm device on the nurse call system. Now, emergency egress can calmly take place in the affected areas.
Of course, such a potentially disastrous scenario would only proceed so smoothly if a robust, code-compliant fire alarm/voice evacuation system had been carefully specified and installed, along with a well-trained facility staff manning the system.
“Hospitals are very unique, complicated buildings, and our systems are the most complicated within a hospital because we have to interface with so many other systems,” explains Kurt Brinkman, principal of Oakland, California-based Intrepid Electronic Systems, whose company recently installed integrated fire alarm/mass notification systems at the renovated VA Palo Alto Health Care System campus in Palo Alto, California, and the new John Muir Medical Center, Walnut Creek in Walnut Creek, California.
Part of this complexity is created by the fact that the systems designer and supplier must closely coordinate with so many different trades, not to mention dealing with stringent hospital code requirements mandating specs like device placement and communication protocols.
“You never know how the job will ultimately be installed out in the field, so the key is to make sure there is enough hardware and capacity built into the design so you can deal with any surprises,” Brinkman advises.
Consequently, the need for a large-capacity system that can be easily reconfigured and expanded led Intrepid to utilize a system controlled by a single workstation for both hospital projects. “The system is very modular and easily scalable, so it allows you to go and add features and functions pretty quickly,” he says.
Design details
