Abstract
Proper ventilation is an important strategy in the practice of infection control. Hospitals are complex atmospheres that require ventilation for thermal comfort of patients as well as control of harmful pathogens infection emissions. The present study is performed on a hospital at Raipur (21.2514° N, 81.6296° E), India, to analyze the avoidance of airborne infections from the mouth of patient to protect the doctor and other patients in the intensive care unit (ICU) using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software FLUENT. Incense smoke is used to for capturing velocity field. Twenty seven (27) cases of simulation were executed using different air change per hour (ACH) (6, 9 & 12) and different inlet and outlet positions talking into account the constant inlet temperature (20 °C). The wall temperatures were taken out from ISHRAE handbook for Raipur region. The velocity vector and capturing the flow field were also performed experimentally. All three turbulence model (Standard, RNG & Realizable) predictions have shown to be in good agreement with the experimental data. It can be effectively employed to validate the extensively used k-ε model which was commonly used for ICU.
Highlights
The dispersion of air borne disease can be impeded if infected patients are segregated from those who are not infected
Virus and other air borne microorganisms which are harmful to living beings are spread through the air we inhale from the surroundings
Adoption of variable inclination angles at inlet is recommended for improving air distribution profiles on applications like medical clean room [18]
Summary
The dispersion of air borne disease can be impeded if infected patients are segregated from those who are not infected. Tracer gas with various ventilation rates of 6 and 12 air change per hour (ACH) had a less impact on the exchange of air across the hinged door They have concluded that the sliding door model in isolated rooms of a hospital have better effectiveness in reducing air volume exchange during opening of door [11]. Tracer gas is used effectively in studying the fluid flow and air borne pathogen transmission in a six-bedded isolated room through walking motion of health care workers (HCW). The control of air flow through rearrangement of air return by regulation from the ward cubicle using CFD on a general ward ventilation design was performed by researcher in a study It assures the removal of microbes effectively at lower cost, minimizing cross infection [17]. (c) (a) II (b) (c) (a) III (b) (c) (a) IV (b) (c) (a) V (b) (c) (a) VI (b) (c) (a) VII (b) (c) (a) VIII (b) (c) (a) IX (b) (c)
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