Title: Section 712-1.28 - Electrical requirements

712-1.28 Electrical requirements.

(a) Adequate electrical outlets shall be provided in each patient room to accommodate equipment that the hospital may use for patient care without use of receptacle adapters. Each patient bedroom shall have at least one duplex electrical receptacle per bed, plus an additional receptacle on another wall. If electric beds are to be used, an additional receptacle is required at the head of each bed. Receptacles in pediatric areas shall be of the safety type. Duplex receptacles for general use shall be installed approximately fifty feet apart in corridors.

(b) Patient rooms shall have general lighting and night lighting. A reading light shall be provided for each patient.

(c) Areas where inhalation anesthetics are used shall conform to NFPA 99, Standard for Healthcare Facilities. Further details concerning this referenced material are contained in section 711.2(a) of this Part. All anesthetizing areas must be grounded. Grounding systems need not be equipotential, but must be installed and maintained in each anesthetizing location with an isolation transformer to minimize the difference in potential which can occur between any conductive surface that the patient can or a person touching the patient contact. Isolation transformers may serve more than one room; however, each room must have its own branch circuit.

(d) For patients' use at each bed, nurses' calling stations shall be provided that will register a call from the patient at the nurses' station and actuate a visual signal at the patient room door, and in the clean workroom, soiled workroom and nourishment station of the nursing unit. In multicorridor nursing units, additional visible signs shall be installed at corridor intersections. An emergency calling station shall be provided convenient for patients' use at each patient toilet, bathroom or shower room. An emergency nurses' calling station shall be provided for nurses' use in each operating, delivery, recovery, emergency and intensive nursing care room, nurseries, supervised wards for psychiatric patients, and rooms for children.

(e) Fire signal systems consisting of an electrically supervised fire alarm system and a detection system shall be provided as follows:

(1) The fire alarm signal shall be coded to indicate fire zone of the station activated and shall be connected to the fire department protecting the facility or to a central station. Any alarm signal in the system shall sound a general alarm audible throughout the building.

(2) A coded fire detection system connected to the fire alarm system of the facility shall be provided in kitchens, boiler rooms and attached garages.

(f) An emergency electric generating set with automatic transfer switch shall provide electricity during an interruption of the normal electric supply to the hospital. Emergency electric service shall be provided to circuits as follows:

(1) To light exitways and all necessary ways of approach thereto, including exit signs and exit direction signs, exterior of exits, exit doorways, stairways, corridors, surgical, obstetrical and emergency room operating lights, nursery, laboratory, recovery room, intensive care areas, nursing stations, medication preparation areas, labor rooms, generator set locations, switch-gear locations, boiler rooms, and elevators required for emergency operation.

(2) For equipment essential to life safety, including nurses' calling system, alarm devices of sprinkler system if electrically operated, fire-detecting and smoke-detecting systems, paging or speaker systems if intended for issuing instructions during emergency conditions, alarms required for nonflammable medical gas systems if installed, fire and domestic water pumps if installed, receptacles for incubators for infants, pumps for central suction systems, sewage or sump pumps if installed, receptacles for blood bank refrigerators, and receptacles in operating, recovery, intensive care and delivery rooms except those for x-ray equipment. In addition, at least one duplex receptacle in each nursing station, duplex receptacles in patient corridors, one elevator where elevators are used to transport patients to operating and delivery rooms or from these rooms to nursing areas on another floor, equipment such as burners and pumps necessary for operation of one or more boilers and their necessary auxiliaries and controls required for heating and sterilization, ventilation of operating and delivery rooms, equipment necessary for maintaining telephone service, one electric sterilizer if installed, and food refrigeration and freezer facilities. In facilities with all electric kitchens, a ratio of three duplex receptacles per nursing unit shall be provided in the kitchen for food preparation unless a prior approved emergency food preparation plan is in effect.