Health & Aged Care

While maintaining compliance with the shopping centre management’s services, OH &  S and security requirements, the original shop fitout and ceilings were demolished and the whole refitted with upgraded hydraulic, mechanical, electrical, communications and security services, new joinery, floor and paint finishes and new mammography and film processing equipment.  Close liaison with the radiology equipment installers over sizes, power requirements and venting of the film processing units were required and a tight program to meet the Public Opening date was met.

At St Josephs Village SBP built new administration offices in the courtyard in the heart of the Village main building, timing material deliveries, concrete pumping etc. and agreeing routes through the premises to minimise disruption to the elderly occupants.  SBP also renewed the roof over the main entry foyer, again timing deliveries to avoid blocking this main entry to the building and carefully managing working times and internal traffic routes and protection to avoid any risk and inconvenience to occupants.  A part of this project was the renewal of the failing perimeter fence wall, done at times and with protection to avoid disrupting pedestrian traffic at this busy intersection and keep the Village occupants safe and secure.

SBP stripped out walls and services from this ward on the 9^th floor amidst the fully operational wards and operating theatres in the 10 storey Parkes Building.  Reinforced blockwork walls and steel lined ceilings were built to secure the premises with steel security doors and gates, steel mesh protection to balconies and an attack proof central viewing area with its own separate access.  Security monitoring and alarm systems, air conditioning, suicide resistant hydraulic fittings (no ligature attachment points), a concealed sprinkler system and protected electrical and medical gases systems were all installed.  The fire protection system being out of the ordinary became design and construct with SBP negotiating between consultants, Corrective Services, the Hospitals Fire Officer and the Fire Brigade to achieve a compliant system that was also tamper proof.

This project involved cutting into and upgrading of existing services on Level 3 of this 10 storey fully operational ward and operating theatre building.   The allocated space was stripped out and SBP constructed the hermetically sealed, HEPA filtered air conditioned cross contamination air locks, PC2 laboratory and cryogenic storage rooms complete with new mechanical, hydraulic, electrical, sprinkler, security access and communications services, new infection control epoxy floor and wall finishes and new chemical resistant laboratory joinery.

An area within the laboratory environment of level 2 of Westmead Hospital was gutted, the existing services redirected where necessary then partitions and suspended ceiling installed, hermetically sealed so that pressurized environments could be created as a part of cross infection protections.  The ceiling space was made trafficable to cater for the air conditioning, filter system, lighting maintenance etc. with partitions and doorways below to separate the various parts of this PC2 laboratory with its pressure graded cross infection control entry and exit chambers (that also functioned as gowning area and secondary laboratory respectively) and the “Open Flow” laboratory, and “Cryopreservation” room.

The rooms and all lights and power outlets were hermetically sealed and sophisticated air conditioning with HEPA Filters installed to the “Sterile Suite” and its entry and exit chambers capable of maintaining working temperatures of 16 degrees Celsius and particulate ingress at less than 35 parts per million in the Bone Marrow Laboratory itself.  This and the new systems to the rest of the rooms were balanced to maintain 30pa of pressure differentiation from the Sterile Suite to the ancillary rooms to avoid contamination back through the entry and exit chambers.

Sophisticated alarms were installed to warn of oxygen depletion, pressurization failure, temperature excess and equipment (fridges etc) malfunction, many of these with remote links back to the Blood Bank in the Hospital and the Building Maintenance Control System.  Fan speeds for pressurization and thermostats for temperature were controllable from within the Sterile Suite.  This is regarded as one of the most sophisticated laboratories of its kind in Australia and worldwide and now processes the bone marrow for a large part of our Public and Private Health network.

The subacute care rooms of the Emergency Department were inadequate in capacity and SBP were commissioned to extend the area by relocation of partitions and smoke doors and to completely refit the space with new ceilings, linings, upgrade the air conditioning, hydraulic, electrical, data and medical gases services and to upgrade the ambulance bay equipment storage pods backing on to Subacute Care.  The Emergency Department operates 24 hours a day so protection against dust and disturbance with access and noisy works times all negotiated daily were essential parts of the management on site.

Strip out of partitions, services and finishes, reconstruction to new layout with new wall and floor finishes, alterations to mechanical, hydraulic, power, light, data and radiotherapy accelerator services, upgrading of power supplies for nuclear accelerators and new medical gases installation and new joinery.  Three stages while facility still running full treatment schedule.  Completed one week ahead of program.