Ambulance Emergency Operations Centres
South Central Ambulance Service (SCAS) NHS Trust
Background
The South Central Ambulance Service (SCAS) covers the UK counties of Berkshire, Hampshire, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire. Its emergency operations centres, which collectively handle more than 340,000 calls a year, were previously based in four locations - Wokingham, Winchester, Oxford and Deanshanger. Following a detailed review, the local NHS Trust approved a reduction to three control centres at Wokingham, Winchester and Bicester,
project
The SCAS Wokingham control room, which covers Berkshire, was retained in the existing site which needed to remain operational while the works took place
CCD services here included:
• Control room design
• Interior design
• Space planning
• Compartment design
• Tender documentation
At Winchester and Bicester, CCD provided ergonomic and space planning services to establish the design and layout of the control room suites.
Implementation
In Wokingham, the control room functions were supported by 14 workstations as well as two management offices, a rest room and an incident/training room with four workstation positions. This was a fast- track project with CCD providing ergonomic and interior design services.
As well as a new partition layout, we raised the ceiling height and installed a sound absorbent ceiling tile system, along with ceiling-mounted task lighting that can be individually controlled by each operative.
We also worked in conjunction with the furniture manufacturer Ahrend to evolve a workstation design to meet the operational requirements. This included a purpose-made pedestal to accommodate the computer processor units and the integrated communications control system equipment (ICCS).
In both cases at Winchester and Bicester, we carried out a plotboard workshop with the stakeholders (call takers, dispatchers, clinical support staff, supervisors etc.) to determine the optimum layout. This was followed by a full size mock-up trial in a disused ambulance warehouse.
All on-desk technology was also mocked-up to allow the positions of the equipment to be discussed and agreed. After completion of the mock-up trials, we issued detailed space planning drawings for the control room suites and individual workstation layouts to the architects and the service engineers for incorporation into their design for the fit-out of each building as a whole. These were accompanied by a document outlining the design and performance requirements for the lighting, air conditioning and acoustics within the control room suite.
Outcome
SCAS Wokingham project was completed in June 2008.
SCAS Winchester project was completed in February 2009.
SCAS Bicester project is due for completion June 2009.
Find out more
Read about other projects
(Cross references to other projects): FiReControl