Hospital Construction: How to Deal with Construction Site Contamination

Constructing a hospital is never easy, more so when you have to deal with site contamination. You have to limit the levels of air and water pollution to ensure that no lives are lost. Remember, you are also responsible for the adjacent lands and not just your construction site. You also need to put measures in place to prevent future contamination once the hospital construction is complete.

Here are 6 crucial stages that will help you deal with hospital site contamination:

Stage 1 – Desktop Study and Soil Testing

Chances are that the past owner of the piece of land where you are building filed a report concerning the site. You need to check for this report with the land authority and find old maps related to your construction site.

The examination of the reports is called Desktop Study and is crucial in deciding whether to test the soil or not.  If the reports show that the land is possibly contaminated, then you should test the soil right away to establish the level of contamination.

Stage 2 – Construction Limits

After studying the Desktop Study Report, you should establish construction limits to reduce the risks of site contamination. Some of the measures you can observe at this stage are:

  • Proper wall ventilation
  • Ductwork sealing
  • HVAC protection and cleaning
  • Distinguished entries and exits
  • System isolation
  • Utility coordination

With the right construction limits in place, you can work towards reducing site contamination to acceptable limits.

Stage 3 – Regulatory Standards Compliance

You need a checklist that shows all the basic regulations that need to be observed throughout the construction. For example, your workers need to be aware of the Infection Control Risk Assessment (ICRA) standards to prevent infections on site. You also need to do auditing at the hospital construction site to check if the laid out regulatory standards are observed. During the audits, you can make adjustments and special requests.

Stage 4 – Better Housekeeping

Housekeeping is a necessity when looking to reduce the risks of hospital site contamination. You need to avoid the buildup of pollutants through the following strategies:

  • Neat stacking of construction supplies
  • Proper storage of sensitive materials
  • Maintaining a clean worksite
  • Pre-treating contaminated surfaces
  • minimizing dust emission

Stage 5 – Validation

After performing soil testing and coming up with regulatory standards, you need to show evidence of compliance.  Simply, you need a completion certificate that you obtain from the local construction authority.  This allows both the workers and the adjacent inhabitants to trust that they are not under any contamination threat.

Stage 6 – Contractor Report

Lastly, you should provide your contractor with a detailed report that shows what is expected of them during hospital construction. You have to define the expectations from the start to allow the project manager to come up with ways to reduce the risks of contamination throughout the construction. If possible, try to hire a construction manager who has first-hand experience in dealing with a similar construction case.

It is never easy to deal with contamination at a hospital construction site. But with the right policies in place, it is less challenging to do it. Your policies need to be simple to implement and result-oriented.