August 2004 Newsletter

MSHFM Members,

Where has the year gone? Where were the extreme summer temperatures? Fall and winter will soon be upon us along with the inflated natural gas costs and snow removal expenses. I hope everyone has had a good year to this point.

I have sent out an invitation to all members for a business meeting, education session and tour of the Hannibal Regional Campus on August 20, 2004. The meeting is on a Friday and given that Hannibal is a state tourist destination, I thought it might lend itself to a short vacation weekend for most of the membership. I hope to see you here. The meetings educational presentation will consist of discussions surrounding the new USP 797, Medical Telemetry systems (WMTS), Patient tracking systems and Voice/IP telephone technology and the NFPA 90A proposal regarding annual testing of smoke/fire dampers.

I would also like to draw your attention to the regulatory advisory from ASHE that is currently on the ASHE and MSHFM web site. Please take time to read the proposed revision to NFPA 90A and send your comments to the technical committee. This proposal if adopted would change the testing frequency of smoke and fire dampers from every four years to annually. I’m not sure what this would do to your institutions, but I can tell you that it would have a negative financial impact at this Hospital. I have sent my comments to the NFPA and would suggest that all members send the comment form in.

The MHA Convention in the Ozarks will be coming up in November and the MSHFM group will be sponsoring an educational session concerning the design considerations of MRI suites. I will provide you more information regarding our groups activities at the MHA Convention after our August 20th meeting.