PRODUCT TESTING
service-users and staff, while manufacturers will be able to approach potential buyers with independent certification of product performance.”
Independent evaluation
While some NHS Trusts and private mental healthcare providers may still want to test items themselves, the BRE’s independent testing at its world-renowned Watford facility should allow the amount of testing undertaken by healthcare providers, who – until now – have largely had to trust manufacturers’ claims and data – to be significantly reduced, saving time and money, and allowing buying choices to be made more confidently and quickly. This should in turn enable new-build and refurbishment projects which might otherwise be delayed by months of product testing to progress on schedule. Philip Ross said: “The new guidance should give an assurance that any given product is fit-for-purpose, and will perform to set parameters. If, say, a clinical team is confident that a doorset or window offers sufficient robustness and minimal ligature risk thanks to it having been BRE-tested, they will be freer to consider other important ‘non-safety’ considerations, such as aesthetics, and the impact on service-users’ self-worth.”
Philip Ross made clear, when I spoke to him early last month, that as the DiMHN’s Innovation & Testing Workstream lead, he had much enjoyed his involvement in the development of the new product testing guidance. He had been greatly assisted by former BRE managing director, Richard Hardy – who has extensive experience in the product testing field, and now acts as a consultant to the building science centre, and by BRE Associate Director, David Gall, and Director, Construction, within the BRE’s Fire and Building Group, Neil Abbott.
Key drivers for guidance I began by asking what drove the DiMHN and BRE to develop the guidance, and why the two bodies believe manufacturers and specifiers should use it. Philip Ross said: “The initial impetus came from Britplas CEO, Kevin Gorman, and Safehinge Primera’s former director, Clive Stone (a former DiMHN Treasurer). There was a general consensus that there remained a lack of clarity in terms of making good decisions about what products to use in mental healthcare settings. The approach taken at the time, and, I believe, still adopted today by many NHS and private mental healthcare providers, is to test every single product on every project. This tends to lead to ‘silos’ of testing, to the extent that two neighbouring Trusts would not necessarily accept the other’s testing, instead undertaking it themselves, which can make the process inefficient. As new products emerge, a Trust may well test every single model of door for every project, and if, for example, a doorset manufacturer launches
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Philip Ross updating delegates on progress with the guidance’s development at the Design in Mental Health 2019 conference in Coventry.
a new door type, and has 50 customers, all 50 might want to test the door. In future, the manufacturer will be able to say to BRE: ‘Can you test this door for me?’ The doorset supplier will then have an independent certification and grading which tells everybody what the performance parameters are.”
Seed sewn
Returning to the start of the initiative, Philip Ross said, “I think the seed was sewn as far back as 2013. From early on, there was a partnership established with BRE, through Chris Hall there, who was aware of DiMHN and its work. Chris, Kevin Gorman, and Clive Stone, got together and recognised there was a gap, product verification-wise, for products used in mental healthcare environments. Both Clive and Kevin had significant requirements for testing, and were commonly having to give existing or potential buyers free products for testing, which tends to raise the price further down the line. They saw a number of potential benefits from publishing product testing guidance – both in terms of better buying decisions, and cost efficiencies for the NHS.”
The working group decided it would aim at producing guidance for testing ligature performance and robustness for all products, with an additional focus on product- specific categories for the two highest-risk product types – doorsets and windows
Philip Ross explained that when he first got involved, around three years ago, the participants set up a small working group – including representatives from door and window manufacturers, estates personnel, and architects. At the first session, it was agreed that two particular product groups that ‘posed challenges’ in mental health settings were doors and windows – regularly highlighted as ‘the major risk points’. Since then, the DiMHN and BRE say this has been further evidenced in the ‘ligatures at all heights’ safety alerts issued in 2018 (EFA 2018-005), which highlighted that 46 per cent of ligature-based suicides occur on a door, with 16 per cent on windows. Philip Ross said: “At that point we felt that perhaps we were initially only going to be able to create tests for doors and windows. However, by the workshops’ conclusion we realised that when looking at and assessing ligature performance – be it a door handle or a coat hook – there’s a consistent pattern of characteristics you will be looking at. We took a step back, and recognised that by focusing solely on doors and windows, we would leave a lot of products out of consideration, and the guidance would struggle for traction.”
A broad spectrum of products The working group thus decided it would aim at producing guidance for testing ligature performance and robustness for all products, with an additional focus on product-specific categories for the two highest-risk product types – doorsets and windows, in separate chapters. The ‘starting point’ was to look at current standards, and any key ‘gaps’, as well as at ‘what was wrong’ with existing standards; in some cases none existed. Philip Ross elaborated: “So, for example, looking at the Door and Hardware Federation’s TS 001: 2013 Technical Specification, Enhanced Requirements & Test Methods for Anti-
JULY 2020 | THE NETWORK
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