About St. Catharines' new hospital

The Niagara Health Authority told Marketplace that the new St. Catharines Hospital boasts cutting-edge measures in infection control. Here's what they told us:

"Building a new healthcare facility is a unique opportunity to incorporate best practices in infection prevention and control through environmental design to help ensure safe, quality care for patients.

This has been one of the goals for the new St. Catharines Site. It is purposefully designed to support a healing environment that is equipped to protect staff, visitors and patients from infections.

Out architects were guided by the OASIS design principles (see attached) which put priority on infection control, operation, accessibility, safety and security, infection control, and sustainability.

When it opens on March 24, 2013, this will be one of the most advanced hospitals in Canada when it comes to infection control

Examples of this include:

80 per cent single occupancy rooms with hand washing sinks in every patient room. This design boasts the highest average of single patient rooms currently available in the province.

All single rooms have a private bathroom and shower for the patient. In the four- bed wards, we have two washrooms.

There are more than 1,200 hand washing sinks together with similar number of alcohol hand rub dispensers within the facility that support hand hygiene compliance. The number of sinks in the new facility is unprecedented and has set a new standard for the hospital designers.

There are separate hand washing sink in each patient room for staff use, as well as sinks in corridors and other common areas for staff and visitors use.

Barrier equipment or PPE (personal protective equipment) cabinets have been designed to hold gloves, goggles, masks, and gowns outside of patient rooms.

We have adhered to all of the infection prevention and control standards at the time of planning for material selection and construction detailing; an example of this is the unique corian walls in the ORs. Corian is a special material; a solid, non porous, seamless surface that is preferable for cleaning and infection control purposes. These are the first ORs in Canada to use this material for wall finishes in an OR.

The hospital has been designed to segregate patient (took out inpatient and outpatient)zones to allow for complete isolation in the event of a pandemic or other significant event. This high-tech design enables the hospital to be split in two separate air handling zones in order to operate in regular and pandemic mode.

There are true isolation rooms with ante rooms on each patient care floor. The isolation of airborne infection requires a negative pressure room that pulls the air into the room to protect other patients on the unit. These rooms will be used to prevent cross-contamination.

The ventilation systems are designed to keep contaminated air from flowing to other parts of the facility.

Articulating arms from the walls and ceilings in key areas such as ORs and ICU bring equipment off the floor and promote better cleaning.

Solid movable partitions have been used in place of curtains and bedside curtains have been minimized wherever possible to ensure easier cleaning.

Elevator banks have been designed to promote safety by separating patients, staff and service into zones distinct from the public."