Connecticut Healthcare Engineers Society
Chapter Representative: Chris Burney, CHFM, acburn@bpthosp.org
President: Ron Hussey, CHFM, rhussey@bristolhospital.org
Vice President: Keith Giannone, kgiannone@stvincents.org
Treasurer: Brian Johnson, bjohnson@lmhosp.org

Meeting Minutes May 5, 2010 Location: Connecticut Hospital Association (CHA), Wallingford, CT   The meeting started at 2:00pm.  There were 10 hospital engineers in attendance and two representatives from the CHA.   The opening presentation was by Adam Barbash, PE, a Senior Project Manager with the environmental engineering company, Fuss and O’Neill.   The state of Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection has established regulations that will require all sewer outlets from any food producing area to flow through a grease separator.  The regulations establish various testing criteria for the effluent and delineates who will be the authority having jurisdiction, which in this case will be primarily the local authorities with oversight by the State DEP.  All hospitals are required to be fully compliant by July 1, 2011. There was a lively discussion following the presentation and Mr. Barbash was warmly thanked for a well thought out program.   There followed a presentation by John Brady, CFO of CHA, that reviewed an initiative by CHA, working with NAACP, to develop an inventory of companies with diversity.  A discussion revealed that this is an attempt to identify and certify minority owned companies to enable hospitals to encourage such enterprises by conducting business with them.   Bob Palumberi of Midstate Hospital reviewed a recent JC inspection that coincided with a State Licensure inspection.  He also introduced to the group the concept of “MSDS On Demand” which appears to offer an excellent way of complying with the HAZMAT Right to Know law.  I can provide details if anyone is interested.   Finally, the CHES sponsorship of the 2011 Spring Conference was reviewed.  In the absence of any competition, I agreed to be the acting chair for the conference until someone else expresses any interest.  Ed Oskandy of Griffin Hospital said that pending approval, his hospital would handle the printing of the fliers.   I proposed the concept of the keynote speaker being a Social Networking Consultant and it was well received.  There will be many more meetings as we develop the entire program.  As an aside, today I met with Lisa Schoonerman and she confirmed that Siemens will again be a corporate sponsor and will assist with the production of name badges.   Submitted May 6, 2010, by Chris Burney

The Connecticut Hospital Engineers met at the Connecticut Hospital Association’s offices on May 13, 2009. There was a lower attendance (eleven) than usual because of a combination of members travelling and State Department of Health inspections.

Those in attendance heard an interesting presentation from Mark Casey, the Safety Officer at St Mary’s Hospital in Waterbury that had recently suffered a total loss of water. In addition, there was brief presentation from John Lombardi of Manchester Hospital on their recent Joint Commission survey.

The news from around the state continues to be gloomy. Greenwich Hospital announced lay offs within the next few weeks of 77 employees, bringing the total to 160 positions eliminated since January. This represents a 10% reduction in their work force.

Today an article in the Connecticut Post newspaper informed the readers that Bridgeport Hospital is planning an as yet unknown number of layoffs in July.

Finally, Connecticut has a brand new CHFM. Me. I took the test this Tuesday and passed.

Submitted by Christopher Burney, CHES Representative to the NEHES Board, acburn@bpthosp.org

March 11, 2009 Meeting

The Connecticut Hospital Engineers met at the Connecticut Hospital Association’s offices on March 11, 2009. About 20 engineers were present, which reflects a continuing improvement in attendance.

A presentation was given by James Albis of Evans and Paul from Plainview, New York. Evans and Paul is a company that works with solid surface products such as Dupont. The presentation explored the benefits of using solid surface counter tops and presented life cycle cost reasons as well as improved infection control reasons.

Of more interest was the portion of the presentation that addressed the custom use of such products. Slides were shown of various shapes and devices that had been constructed from Corian.

After the presentation, there was a round table discussion about many items. Of concern to all in attendance was the continuing and increasingly poor financial performance of hospitals in Connecticut. Lower Fairfield County, which used to be known as the Gold Coast and was consistently one of the top five counties in the nation for per capita income, is seeing a precipitous drop in the demand for services. For example, Stamford Hospital has seen a 30% drop in med/surg admissions when measured from January 2008 to January 2009. Since a great number of the residents in this area work, or worked in NYC, it is assumed that the job loss on Wall Street has had a dramatic impact on the community’s access to health insurance.

Other hospitals in the state are seeing a more modest decline in demand, but an increase in the number of patients who either have no insurance, or are on Medicaid. In addition there is a marked increase in the number of insurance company denials of service.

The group also discussed briefly whether to have a summer picnic. Last year was the first one and it was very successful.

Submitted by Christopher Burney, CHES Representative to the NEHES Board, acburn@bpthosp.org