Case Study: hospital plant room asset management with GS1 barcodes

Creating Safe, Sustainable and Efficient Built Environment for Children's Health Ireland

Hospital plant room management at CHI Urgent Care Centre powered by globally unique GS1 identifiers for assets and locations, barcode tags and the Fexillon Digital Asset Lifecycle Platform.

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The plant room in any hospital or large-scale building is a major control centre and a hub for routine, reactive and planned preventative maintenance (PPM).

There is a wide range of critical and semi-critical equipment on site that needs to be monitored and maintained, including air handling units, water treatment units, medical gases, cooling equipment, pumps and universal power supplies (UPS) to name but a few.

Bag and filter changes, cleaning and pump recalibration would all be typical examples of planned preventative maintenance tasks. Visits from engineers and technicians are scheduled throughout the year to maintain and repair this equipment. 

Managing health and safety compliance

In the aftermath of COVID a “tap and go” system will become the new working model for managing on-site visits by maintenance engineers. The “tap and go” points, located throughout the hospital will enable visiting technicians to scan in on arrival, without the need for interaction with hospital staff. Identification of the engineer will enable the facilities management team to confirm that all the necessary induction and health and safety tickets have been completed and are up-to-date for the visiting engineer.

By combining known information, such as the engineer’s ID, their trade and the scanning location point, wayfinding and directional information can be shown on the technician’s device, directing them to the plant room or the location of the equipment they are on-site on maintain.

Protecting Lone Workers

The visiting technician will have an allocated amount of time to complete the maintenance work and the Facilities Management team will have visibility of this. Should the engineer not log out within the allotted time, the team can check-in and see if there is an issue or if more time is needed. It also supports Health and Safety practices on site, providing visibility of Lone Workers and contact details for managers, should an unfortunate incident occur.

Ensuring data interoperability across multiple sites and systems

Globally unique identifiers, based on the GS1 system of standards, play a key role in enabling data visibility and interoperability across the hospital sites and systems. Each room or location, each asset [SD1] and each technician [SD2] can all be uniquely identified with a GS1 code, enabling data sharing across hospital systems and sites.

Creating the future of Digital Facilities Management

CHI are currently transitioning from older sites to new, more modern digital healthcare hubs. Facilities management processes are becoming more streamlined, with remote access to Building Management Systems (BMS) and other platforms.

Each plant room asset has been uniquely identified with a Global Individual Asset Identifier (GIAI), encoded in a GS1 Data Matrix barcode or QR code. Scanning these barcodes enables staff and engineers to access a vast array of information, relevant to their role. For example, a technician attending to service a water pump can view the list of spares or installation instructions, while the CHI FM team can view lists of spare parts available on site or the asset’s maintenance history. This level of real-time data availability can also assist with the efficient management of inventory and the ordering of spare parts.

CHI working towards a more efficient, greener and safer environment

CHI are implementing a broad range of innovative measures as part of their facilities management operations, helping to minimise or eliminate any unplanned downtime across the site. These measures also reflect the new regulatory changes, drive energy efficiency and support CHI work towards a green campus.

These measures include:

• a Building Management System (BMS) that enables the full remote monitoring of all equipment
• real-time data availability to schedule preventative maintenance visits in advance
• adopting "BREEAM in Use" to minimise the carbon footprint of the hospital

“The future is having everything at your fingertips, all the information that is needed in a one centralised location - this all leads to lower carbon footprint.

I'm very excited to see how we'll transition from the older sites into the newer sites; how these processes will be streamlined; how future automation technologies will come into place. It's positive for both the patients, the staff and the maintenance staff working in this environment.” Peadar Hanlon, Engineering Officer, CHI

About CHI

Peadar Hanlon and his team currently look after the reactive and planned preventative maintenance across three sites: Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) at Temple Street, and the two Urgent Care Centres in Connolly and Tallaght.

We would like to thank the Children's Health Ireland (CHI) Facilities Management Team at the Urgent Care Centre in Tallaght, Dublin and our Platinum Solution Partner Fexillon for their time and valued collaboration to make this video possible.