edical facilities rely on a steady flow of power to operate electrical medical
equipment, keep the lights on and access patient data online. Equipment or system failure could lead to breakdowns, downtime and fatal consequences for patients. For example, in summer 2019, a large-scale
power outage left 48 million people across Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay without electrical supply. Power was out for only a day, but it impacted vital infrastructure, including hospitals, which had to use generators to continue treating patients. Power outages like this are out of the control of hospital directors and doctors but we can take preventative steps to ensure that power fluctuations do not impact operations.
RETURNING TO POWER
Generators can help to provide power in desperate situations, but some critical equipment such as ventilators and other monitors must have a con- stant stream of power to reduce risks to patients. Instead of relying on temporary power generators, hospital directors and facilities managers should
have a plan to stop any interruptions to power flow. An uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system
should be a key part of a healthcare facility’s preventative maintenance strategy. UPS systems supply backup energy in the event of power losses and can protect electrical and electronic systems from issues when losing the primary power source. A UPS is an essential bridge between a mains supply and the power provided by a backup diesel generator.
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PROTECTING EQUIPMENT
However, power loss isn’t the only issue that the managers of medical facilities should have on their agenda. Medical device equipment is incredibly sensitive – as is the human body. In fact, once the electrical insulation provided by our skin is taken away, for example during open surgery, a voltage as insignificant as the one passed on when you touch your mobile phone screen can be lethal. Given that IBM estimates that there are 120
power quality problems effecting sensitive equipment in a typical building every single month, it is clearly important to keep our medical
equipment in perfect condition. One way of doing this is to eliminate the low-level
switching events, or transients, that occur constantly in electrical supply. Transients have high energy, with magnitudes in the thousands of volts, and short duration with rise times in the 1-10 microsecond range. While these surges are short, transients can disrupt, damage or destroy electrical and electronic equipment in an instant. Eliminating these transient surges reduces electrical damage and improves patient service by keeping electrical equipment out of the maintenance bay. Energy Control Systems has developed SineTamer
— a range of highly efficient surge and transient protection systems that help to protect valuable microprocessor based assets. SineTamer tracks events close to the sinewave, which would be invisible to most power quality devices, and eliminates the problems caused by regular transient events. Our experts will also work with hospital directors to develop a bespoke system with any special configurations needed to comply with medical industry regulations.
ENERGY CONTROL SYSTEMS
ecsintl.com
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