Sunderland Emergency Department

Specialist areas were provided within the new Emergency Department such as High Acuity, High Dependency, Resuscitation, X-Ray, Ultrasound, CT Scanning and De-Contamination, all of which required detailed and extensive servicing arrangements to support the function of each space.

The Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing, Medical Gases and Pneumatic tube systems were valued at circa £6m and involved a complete service renewal throughout, which included new central plant and electrical distribution facilities. TGA worked very closely with designers, P+HS Architects and Buro Happold Civil and Structural to fully co-ordinate the services within a digital 3D environment using Autodesk Revit. This high level collaboration ensured that services were sized and placed accurately to represent the final installed arrangement, providing confidence to the installer,  that the services could be installed with limited risk to programme and costs.

The project was phased to allow the existing A&E department to function continuously without disruption. The services were designed to accommodate and respect existing operational facilities, which resulted in sensitive operations in live areas of the hospital. Maintaining the operational state of existing hospital facilities in and around the area of works was of prime concern to the Hospital.

Project issues and lessons learnt:

The use of 3D design & coordination through Revit was a major benefit, however, as this was an existing ‘live’ building, the site scan information was limited and therefore, brought with it a number of issues regarding on-site coordination. For future projects, more detailed surveys will be required.