The fire risk prevention in healthcare centres

Despite fire risk is one of the major occupational hazards, it is often underestimated because these events don't happen very frequently. Nonetheless, when there is a fire hazard the damages that it can cause are very serious both for the loss of human lives and goods as well.
Anyway these events happen: three fire hazards happened last December: the first at the Paracelsus Clinic in Castaneda where two patients were intoxicated, the second at the Mellino Mellini Hospital in Chiari and the last one at the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan.
In order to both reduce the risk and manage an emergency, the law which regulates fire hazards prevention was updated last year ( Ministerial Decree 19th March 2015 ).
The Decree covers all the main themes related to fire hazard risk:

– Identification and evaluation of the dangers stemming from the activity;
– Human resources organization;
– Operational control of the subsequent adjustment stages;
– Managing changes;
– Emergency planning;
– Rescue Teams safety;
– Performances control taking into consideration Chrono programs as well;
– Protection systems maintenance;
– SGSA.

The aforementioned Ministerial Decree has established that both public and private healthcare centres should have sent by the end of last April a document called SCIA under art.4 of the Presidential Decree n.151/11 which established the adoption of a specific system to prevent fire hazards (named SGSA system) compliant with the Ministerial Decree 18th September 2002, Title V.
The SGSA, as previously pinpointed in the Presidential decree (10th March 1998) and before that in the law decree 626/94 focuses on the importance of risk handling when it comes to prevent fire hazards from happening.

In particular the SGSA should have:

– a document containing a plan of action on how to prevent fire hazards signed by the person in charge. The document must contain the budget available for safety in a set period of time.
– the analysis of the main fire-related causes and dangers affecting people safety.
– a system of preventative control tests which can guarantee that the new adopted measures are maintained at all levels ( prohibitions, limitations, procedures, etc.)
– a plan to handle emergencies;
– a training plan for the staff and an organizational chart showing the fire prevention staff, supervisors included. The number of the people involved is indicated below.

Furthermore, it is necessary to appoint a technical supervisor who will be in charge of planning, coordinating and checking the procedures and a fire prevention team that will be in charge of carrying out preventative controls, intervene in case of an emergency and supporting the other staff.

This integration among all the preventative measures can help in handling more thoroughly the risk and it sets limits both for the time frame to take actions and the necessary compensation of the residual risk during the adjustment phase.
Since healthcare centres are often over-packed and full of patients who are no longer self-sufficient they can be included among those types of activities which carry a high fire risk and therefore deserve special measures to be taken.