HCO News recently touched base with John Davenport, chief scientist of Energy Focus, on the positive aspects of LED lighting for healthcare venues and some of the recent advances in LED tech. Due to LED tech’s growing popularity, requests were put in place to have LED-based lighting installed in many medical centers and clinics in the surrounding area with the help of local services similar to the electrician bentleigh company, Fernee. To date, Energy Focus has facilitated the retrofitting of fluorescent lights with state-of-the-art LED technology at more than 60 facilities, ranging from the National Institutes of Health, Cleveland Clinic, and Mayo Clinic to the Mount Sinai Health System.

HCO News: How can healthcare professionals benefit from the visual acuity and actual color rendering light that LED lighting provides?

DAVENPORT: LEDs, in general, produce a closer match to the smooth solar spectrum which contains all the colors and do a better job making colors look more like they might appear under sunlight. By comparison, fluorescent spectrums are typically “spiky” and as a result are deficient in many colors – particularly red. Many healthcare professionals, particularly those who are sensitive to fluorescent’s “spiky” spectrum, find living and working under LEDs a welcome relief as fluorescent lamps’ light output can change as the AC power line goes to zero 120 times a second. Such light modulation or “flicker” can have serious negative health consequences including causing headaches as well as interfering with performing tasks involving rapid eye movement – such as reading. This is particularly important for critical health care reading tasks such as, for example, quickly selecting the proper dosage morphine ampoule for a patient who has just developed an acute pulmonary edema. While LEDs can also produce “flicker,” LED products incorporating advanced “flicker-free” LED technology effectively reduce flicker levels to zero.

HCO News: How can the health hazards of fluorescent lighting can be alleviated by LED lighting?

DAVENPORT: LEDs emit light in a continuous, non-spiky, spectrum – like the sun – so all the colors are present in a smooth and continuous way; LEDs don’t emit light in the UV so, unlike fluorescent, there’s no risk of UV exposure; LEDs are a solid state light source so, unlike fluorescent, there is no mercury discharge – and thus no mercury hazard; unlike fluorescents, LEDs don’t require a near vacuum to operate and therefore there’s no risk of a glass implosion if you drop one. While LEDs can — like fluorescent can — produce “flicker,” advanced products using “flicker-free” LED technology are now available that have effectively reduced flicker to zero.

HCO News: What are the advantages of flicker-free LED lights over earlier-generation LED technology?

DAVENPORT: Everyone is sensitive to flicker to some degree. It may contribute to headaches, eyestrain and fatigue; research also suggests it can exacerbate migraines. Certain individuals, such as those on the autism spectrum, experience visual hypersensitivity, where lighting triggers can result in heightened symptoms. Flicker can also induce stop-seizures-meds.com in people with photosensitive epilepsy. While there are no standards that require lighting manufacturers to remove flicker, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE 1789) indicates that having less than five percent flicker (at power line frequency) presents a low risk to these populations. LED Lamps incorporating “flicker-free” technology with flicker levels of less than one percent eliminate these risks altogether.

HCO News: Is there an effective way for LEDs to play a role in preparing healthcare facilities for emergencies such as power outages?

DAVENPORT: Since LED tubes use fewer than half the watts of fluorescent tubes and since most of the space inside a modern LED tube is empty, some of the space can be occupied by re-chargeable batteries. This means that the light can never “go out” in a healthcare facility. These “emergency” lights monitor the power line and automatically revert to battery operation in the event of a power failure. While the light might only be available for a few hours, they provide ample time for “back-up” power electrical generators to engage for a prolonged outage.

HCO News: Can hospitals save significantly on energy costs by utilizing LED lighting?

DAVENPORT: LED tubes use fewer than half the watts of fluorescent and have many times the life. As a result, hospital savings can be substantial. A Department of Energy Study has reported, for example, that The Cleveland Clinic has saved more than $717,800 in electricity costs annually after upgrading 49,900 fixtures from fluorescent to LED tubes. In addition, since LED tubes last much longer than fluorescent, the cost to maintain the lighting is also drastically reduced. Switching to LEDs literally pays for itself – often in less than a year.

HCO News: What is the process of retrofitting existing fluorescent lights with LED lighting?

DAVENPORT: Switching to LED tubes is a simple process of turning off the power, rewiring the sockets to bypass the fluorescent ballast and turning the power back on – something that might take 15 minutes per fixture to accomplish by a hospital’s maintenance staff or an external retrofitting company.

The post The Benefits of LED Lighting for Healthcare Facilities appeared first on HCO News.

SUPERIOR, Colo. — A groundbreaking ceremony was held on April 4 for the new Superior Medical Center in Superior. While the new development is not expected to be complete until January 2018, the new medical center is already 50 percent leased to multiple tenants. The new medical center will provide imaging services (MRI, CT and X-ray), urgent care, primary care and orthopedics once complete.

The four-story, 60,000-square-foot building has a budget of $18.5 million, and includes a pedestrian bridge on the second floor that will lead to a four-level parking structure with 229 parking spaces. Intergroup Architects in Littleton, Colo., is the architect on the project, with DSP Builders Inc. out of Denver serving as the general contractor. Pacific Medical Building (PMB) in San Diego, Calif., and the Sawtooth Development Group LLC in Ketchum, Idaho, are both working as the project developers for the new facility.

As the new medical center is located adjacent to “The Sports Stable” — a large indoor sports facility — which was strategically placed since a major goal of the new medical center is to support the medical needs of the many athletes who use it, in addition to the growing community in the downtown Superior master-planned development.

“The reason for this project really was Dr. Hsin, (orthopedic physician at the Sports Stable) he was the visionary behind this,” explained Matt Scoggins, project manager of Sawtooth Development Group in a recent statement. “Given the Sports Stable being [in close proximity to the new building] and the anticipated 1.5 million people coming in and out of there every year playing everything from pickleball to lacrosse to hockey, he thought it would be a synergistic opportunity to bring in that kind of medical backstop for support.”

The building includes energy-efficient LED lighting and PMB-selected locally-sourced finishes made in the U.S. and with recyclable content, according to Bill Smith, senior principal at Intergroup. “The 229-car, off-street parking facility will help reduce traffic and parking concerns for downtown Superior,” said Smith. “The facility will also provide a better accessible experience for patients, visitors, doctors and staff, with the pedestrian bridge. Bicycle racks provided in the parking facility will also encourage a reduction in vehicle traffic to and from downtown.”

The medical office building elevations reflect a variety of building materials, colors, heights and façade articulation/relief, according to Smith. Additionally, varying building materials and colors serve to distinguish building corners, base walls and floor levels, according to Smith. “Elevations feature brown stucco columns that define each building corner, and red brick which matches the brick used on The Sports Stable building to the south,” said Smith.

The defining architectural elements of the parking garage will be the structure’s four corners, which are distinguished by brick, split-face CMU block and contrasting stucco finishes, according to Smith. The north side of the parking structure also features a tower element on each corner that corresponds with each stairway location.

“We’re excited about the opportunity to be part of the downtown Superior project as it represents the continued evolution of the principles of consumerism in health care delivery,” said Jake Rohe, partner and senior vice president at PMB in a recent statement. “The Superior Medical Center will provide a variety of ambulatory uses in a community–focused, mixed-use master plan.”

The post Superior Medical Center Begins Construction on New Building appeared first on HCO News.

It has been said that everything is bigger in Texas, and Dallas’ Parkland Hospital is no exception. Open to patients Aug. 20, 2015, the new hospital is intended to serve 30,000 people per day for the next 50 years. When construction started in 2008, it was the 10th largest medical construction project in the world, and the largest public health care project in the country built in a single phase. Today it is ranks as the 31^st largest hospital in the United States. While working with this facility, Kenosha, Wis.-based Kenall LED Lighting and Controls was asked to provide a streamlined, ultra reliable lighting solution.

Parkland was designed by a joint venture of architectural firms HDR, based in Omaha, Neb., and Corgan, based in Dallas. Because of the facility’s size and design parameters, sourcing consistent, reliable, energy-efficient lighting products that could be delivered on time and on budget was a very important piece of the Parkland puzzle.

“Our biggest challenge was the sheer scale of the project, so we wanted to keep the [lighting] design as simple as possible and be consistent throughout,” said Jeffrey Hargens, an electrical engineer and lighting designer at HDR.

To keep maintenance and relamping simple, specifiers selected sealed MedMaster T5 luminaires for the 862 patient rooms. In addition, Kenall provided a combination of LED and fluorescent lighting fixtures for the corridors, surgical suites, MRI and imaging suites, bathrooms and workstations, including:

• MedMaster Behavioral Health luminaires
• Mighty Mac patient room luminaires
• SimpleSeal corridor lighting
• MedMaster exam lighting
• MedMaster surgical suite lighting
• Stratalume task lighting
• CleanScene graphic panel luminaires for MRI and imaging suites
• Auracyl wall sconces
• MedMaster sealed downlights
• MedMaster vanity lights
• SoftStep Contour and MightyMac step lights

• Lighted wayfinding and informational signage

The Parkland Hospital project was Kenall’s largest single project to date — one awarded based on a reputation for consistency, quality and on-time delivery.

“This is a job that you can’t have a manufacturer back out of or be late on: other suppliers had issues, but we never had any complaints with Kenall,” Hargens said.

Despite its size, the Parkland Hospital project was delivered on budget and only four months behind schedule. The building was originally projected to be 1.68 million square feet in size, but eventually reached 2.8 million square feet and 17 stories tall.

As a result of innovations in many areas, including lighting, it is also environmentally friendly. The hospital was expected to achieve LEED Silver certification, but in June 2015 it was awarded LEED Gold certification by the USGBC.

Frank Gonzales is the director of product management at Kenall. He can be contacted at 262- 891-9700.

The post Company Highlight: Kenall Illuminates Dallas’ New Parkland Hospital appeared first on HCO News.