Saturday, February 23, 2013

Engineering in the News



        Sanford Expansion             

The building of the new Sanford Health facility is perhaps the biggest project going on in the Fargo, Moorhead area. It will be the largest health facility in North Dakota. According to the article the building will be 1.2 million square feet. The expansion will increase the capability to treat and admit patients. This construction project will benefit more than just those directly involved in the health care system. It will increase employment by increasing jobs. To efficiently such a large building requires a lot of staffing. 

This project is important to my field because of the amount of hours that will be spent on it by industrials. Industrial engineers will be working closely with doctors and nurses to establish the best way to design the floor layout of the hospital.

Floor layout in a newly constructed hospital is very important. You must take into account each individual floor or department of the facility. Floors can more or less be designed to resemble each other in order to increase the uniformity of the building. This also makes it easier for people like doctors and nurses to find things on floors they may not have worked in before. Knowing where to place supply closets or waste rooms relative to the patient’s room can become a little tricky.
Sanford has spent millions on expansion.

From an industrial point of view the hospital needs to function on a level that will allow it to maintain its operation costs down. You don’t want most of your expense costs to be because of inefficiently placed rooms. If supplies that are accessed quite frequently are place too far from the actual place of use, a waste of time is soon developed. This could lead to inadequate care given to patients or others seeking services.

 You want to be able to enhance the stay of the patient by making the jobs of nurses, doctors or those providing the service as easy as possible. The increase of work that an industrial has is amazing. Industrial engineers in a hospital do look at floor layouts but they also can deal with ergonomics and finding ways to make work sharing a little simpler.



Another place where the influence of industrial engineers is seen is in the management corporate area. Here is where critical thinking comes into play. Dealing with the money that was fund raised is very important. You don't want to spend too much in one single place that is not necessarily need. As an industrial you bring all the information gathered from talking to the employees or just analyzing the floor layouts. Industrial engineers along with the doctors, nurses and chairmen of Sanford form and integrated system of people. Communication between these people is vital, making sure everyone is on the same page and that compromises are being made will greatly decrease unwise spending.

It is always exciting to have such a huge expansion happening in a hospital. Doing this kind of job is very interesting. I love change. The opportunity to improve is so appealing. To be a part of a team that is solely interested in developing new ways to make interaction between components (workers, supply rooms or anything really) is my ideal goal.

As an industrial engineer opportunities are everywhere you chose to look. Our field is widely applicable. This article proves that where ever there is growth whether it be in the manufacturing industry or in a facility that offers services, there will always be an opportunity for an industrial engineer to contribute to its community.

1 comment:

  1. I like your connection back to industrial engineering, I can only imagine the amount of time and planning that goes into such a large project. So many logistics are involved with every single step of the process. Sanford is expanding fast in North Dakota, it will be interesting to see how the competition will get after this new addition is done.

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