Why Modern Hospitals Are Betting Big on Anterooms for Dust Containment

As a facility manager, your role comes down to making the best use of the available resources — whether it’s space, budget, safety, etc. Particularly when invasive construction or renovations threaten to throw off daily operations, you’re tasked with keeping everyone in the facility safe and healthy with the tools at your disposal. 

While processes and procedures can certainly make a big difference in the type of environment you’re creating for your hospital or medical center, the equipment and tools that you employ are extremely beneficial ways to support your dust containment system and prioritize infection control. In today’s blog, we’ll be breaking down beyond the anteroom definition to the reasons why modern hospitals trust the HEPACART® AnteRoom and how they can support your pursuit of clean construction in healthcare. 

The HEPACART AnteRoom Advantage

There’s nothing like an AnteRoom when it comes to infection control or dust containment. In fact, healthcare facilities around the world have already discovered the value of AnteRooms in their hospitals. Big names like JE Dunn, Turner, and Mortenson all regularly use AnteRooms in their construction and renovation projects and have seen their ability to support even the most strict ICRA (Infection Control Risk Assessment) Category V projects. Whether through patient isolation or dust and debris containment, AnteRooms make instant isolation easy for busy medical facilities. From eco-friendly construction and repair projects to instant isolation rooms when necessary, HEPACART AnteRooms provide value for healthcare centers in a variety of ways. 

How AnteRooms Support Eco-friendly Hospital Projects

Construction and renovation projects bring significant value to your facility, but it’s no secret that they also have a real impact on the environment and community around your hospital or medical center. Not only does a new or renovated facility mean more places for community members to receive treatment and care, but the construction itself has an impact on traffic, air quality, and other important environmental factors. Because of this impact, it’s more important than ever that green construction is a priority and that facilities prioritize classifications like LEED certifications to help support more eco-friendly practices. 

While it may not seem obvious, hospital AnteRooms can play a role in a facility that is cleaner and greener than it might otherwise be. Compared with other means of separating areas in a medical center like disposable plastic wall barriers, AnteRooms not only provide more function, but they also can be used again and again to ensure a higher level of sustainability from one construction project to another. AnteRooms provide total room isolation, a containment measure that mitigates patient risk from work dust and related contaminants.

Ensure Proper Isolation of Sensitive Areas With AnteRoom and AIR Negative Air Machines

When your hospital needs isolation, nothing else will do. Particularly when construction and renovation projects interrupt normal daily rhythms, proper isolation with an AnteRoom can directly support a positive patient experience and limit the spread of hospital-acquired Infections, or HAIs. When isolation is done correctly, the AnteRoom can operate as a Class V infection control area, like a negative pressure room, as indicated by the ICRA matrix. 

Are you in need of an even more powerful approach to isolation? Consider pairing your AnteRoom with a negative air machine to create an artificial airflow that will not allow airborne particles as well as dust and debris, to leave a dedicated area. Set up with an AnteRoom, the negative air machine allows your construction teams and medical staff to move from one area to another safely and without spreading infection unnecessarily. In fact, when used with a negative air machine, an AnteRoom meets requirements for both the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) for emergency patient isolation, as required in cases of bioterrorism or highly infectious diseases such as smallpox or COVID-19.

Be Prepared for Safe Hospital Repairs Anytime With AnteRooms 

Routine maintenance is a fact of life in bustling hospitals. Still, it shouldn't come at the cost of patient safety. What is an AnteRoom able to offer to your facility? AnteRooms present a practical solution, allowing for extensive maintenance work without the risk of spreading dust and bacteria, ensuring that even the most sensitive hospital zones remain uncontaminated. Using an AnteRoom, workers can move between the maintenance and patient areas easily and without fear of contamination. This also allows for even last-minute repair projects to benefit from the protection that AnteRooms can provide. While ceiling access carts are helpful for smaller ceiling access maintenance projects, some maintenance requires larger crews and, therefore, larger isolated areas, making a perfect scenario for a healthcare AnteRoom. 

Choosing the Right AnteRoom for Your Needs

For any project, you need the tools that are going to help you best complete your work in a timely and efficient manner. This same principle of selecting the right tool for the job applies to AnteRooms, which is why HEPACART offers a variety of AnteRoom products to meet your project needs. 

We offer three distinct models — AnteRoom 36, AnteRoom 48, and AnteRoom Patient Access 48 —  each meticulously designed to cater to different door dimensions. 

AnteRoom 36:

Our AnteRoom 36 measures 39.5" in width, 24" in depth, and 85.5" in height, making it an ideal choice for facilities with smaller door dimensions. This model offers the option of adding extenders to accommodate larger doors, ensuring that even if your facility has a range of door sizes.

AnteRoom 48:

The AnteRoom 48 comes with working dimensions of 51.75" W x 24" D x 85.5" H. This larger model has been designed with versatility in mind, with the ability to add additional extenders and reducers to accommodate doors ranging from 36" to 52". 

AnteRoom Patient Access 48:

Our AnteRoom Patient Access 48 has working dimensions of 48" W x 24" D x 85.5" H. This model is specially designed for wider access, fitting a 48" door natively and accommodating other door sizes up to 72" with extenders.  

Investing in Anterooms: Balancing Safety With Budget Constraints

Investing in an AnteRoom is a decision that pays dividends in patient and staff safety. However, it doesn't have to strain your budget. The long-term cost savings of using reusable AnteRooms, compared to disposable alternatives, make them a financially savvy choice for any facility looking to maintain operations and safety during renovations. 

One of the best ways that you can keep your bottom line in check is by ensuring that your facility can continue with normal operations as much as possible through construction and renovation work. An AnteRoom can do the work of a permanent vestibule while offering the reusability and flexibility of a temporary door. Because they can be moved from one area to another, an AnteRoom provides tons of value because it can create an instant isolation room when you need it for a particular project, but can then be used over and over. This allows your investment in an anteroom to be ultimately spread across endless construction or renovation projects over the years. 

Elevate Your Facility’s Patient Care With an Anteroom

For facility managers at hospitals, ensuring the safety and well-being of patients and staff is always top of mind, especially during construction or maintenance work. That's where Anterooms come in. With HEPACART AnteRooms, you get a practical, cost-effective solution that helps you to take on the challenges of keeping your environment safe and operations smooth, all without blowing your budget. 

Interested in learning more about sourcing your ideal AnteRoom solution? Explore our free pricing guide and start your journey toward powerful healthcare dust containment today.