Fire safety


be very different. Care homes, of course, are businesses too and the financial impact can be significant. In fact, the Fire Protection Association (FPA) and RISCAuthority research shows the average cost of a large fire event to be over £650,000. As care homes are deemed high-risk


premises, and because there is likely to be a varying dependency level among residents in any care environment, a universal approach to fire safety and risk assessment is unrealistic. Similarly, those responsible for fire safety are likely to have varying levels of skills and competency. So, what steps do care home businesses need to take to ensure they have the right fire safety measures in place?


Know your building Limit the use of combustible building materials and methods Protection from fire starts with understanding the materials your care home has been built with and how the building was designed. The FPA believes that some modern


methods of construction that have been commonly used in the care home sector are not appropriate. For example, sustainability is a now major consideration when choosing building materials and rightly so. However, this increased focus on environmental responsibility should not detract from the need to ensure fire resilience at every step of the design and construction process. It is vital that materials, products


and processes that have the potential to impact on a building’s fire safety are properly validated for their intended use. While we are seeing a shift in favour of more natural materials such as timber, this has an effect on fire safety due to the combustibility of the material. Knowing what materials your care


home has been constructed with – including any renovation work at any stage in the home’s history – will help you to better understand how a fire might spread and therefore how to protect against it.


Compartmentation Similarly, understanding how


compartmentation works in the design of a care home is an important part of knowing your building. Compartmentation is a crucial measure in limiting the spread of fire and smoke by, for example, creating protected escape routes and protecting critical infrastructure. Essentially, this is achieved through


the provision of fire resisting walls and floors – with measures to address any openings in the compartment lines such as doors, glazing, service penetrations and ductwork – to contain a fire for a designated length of time. Should you be carrying out any


renovation work to your care home, it is important to be aware of an existing wall, floor or ceiling’s potential fire protection role and the compartmentation strategy within a new design. Even where minor retrospective


works are carried out, such as the installation of data cabling or re-routing of other services, the integrity of compartmentation can be compromised, especially in areas generally hidden from view such as above false ceilings, in service risers or in loft spaces.


Assess the risk Legislation requires every business to ensure that a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment has been undertaken and to have put in place general fire safety precautions to protect all users of its facilities. In the case of care homes this should, of course, include residents, staff and visitors. The varying dependency levels of care


home residents is a key consideration in any risk assessment. Therefore, taking a person-centred approach, in which controls and measures are implemented for all residents individually, is essential in ensuring that effective arrangements are in place. This means staff numbers are suitable at all times of the day and night and all occupants can be evacuated safely in the event of an emergency. As well as supporting a fire strategy


that takes into consideration the needs of all building users, a competent fire risk assessor will also identify potentially hazardous substances within the care home environment. This may include oxygen cylinders, ointments and fuel used in back-up generators. When judging the fire risk of such


substances, the best approach is to enlist specialist support and undergo


October 2021 • www.thecarehomeenvironment.com 39


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