NHS Lanarkshire
Improving emergency planning and resilience at NHS Lanarkshire
24 March 2025 Reading time: 3 minutes
“Working in collaboration with Business Stream has delivered significant improvements to the water infrastructure across our estate with enhanced resilience, practice and process for water management during emergencies. This effort contributes significantly to our goal for the continuous, safe operation of our healthcare services with patient safety at the heart of our operations.”
Background
The National Health Service (NHS) Lanarkshire is the third largest health board in Scotland serving a population of 655,000 people across the county. Employing around 12,000 staff, NHS Lanarkshire covers all communities, health centres, clinics, offices and three district general hospitals – University Hospital Hairmyres, University Hospital Monklands and University Hospital Wishaw.
Under the Public Scotland Sector Framework, Business Stream has been providing water and waste water services, including added value services, to NHS Lanarkshire since 2020.
The challenge
Ensuring a reliable water supply is critical for patient safety, especially in acute healthcare facilities. As part of its service provision to critical sites, including hospitals, prisons, and hospices, Business Stream worked with NHS Lanarkshire to review their existing emergency water plans and identify improvements.
Following a review of the existing water infrastructure, Business Stream was able to identify a need to update the health board’s existing emergency water plans and alternate water delivery methods, as well as the water network arrangements to support this.
In addition, this was an opportunity to support NHS Lanarkshire on reviewing key organisational roles and responsibilities during water emergencies; to reinforce collaborative working among key stakeholders; and to create confidence in the effective management of water risks with enhanced resilience for water outages.
The solution
To address these challenges across NHS Lanarkshire’s sites, Business Stream implemented a multi-faceted approach which included:
- thoroughly reviewing and revising 16 emergency water plans to ensure they met current standards and requirements,
- installing seven new tanker fill points across critical sites to facilitate a more efficient and reliable water supply during emergencies, and
- upgrading water pipework and valves where this was required to ensure smooth day-to-day operations, including during a water emergency.
This effort was supported by close collaboration between key stakeholders at NHS Lanarkshire and Business Stream, with the combined expertise and coordinated efforts ensuring a comprehensive approach to making vital improvements.
Additionally, Business Stream has arranged regular auditing of emergency water plans with NHS estates staff ensuring the plans remain accurate and up to date, by providing updates on any infrastructure changes too.
The result
As a result of these improvements, the water risk management and resilience of the healthcare facilities for NHS Lanarkshire have been significantly enhanced.
The upgraded infrastructure and newly installed tanker fill points ensure a more reliable and efficient water supply during potential water emergencies. And the revised emergency water plans provide a clear and actionable framework for responding to potential water outages, while on-going regular auditing of the emergency water plans with NHS Estates Staff has ensured that the plans remain accurate and up to date. The collaborative efforts of both NHS Lanarkshire and Business Stream have led to a more robust and resilient water management system.
Overall, the continuous improvement in water management practices have ensured the safe operational delivery of water for healthcare services, practices and processes and continuity of supply in the event of a major water outage, ultimately ensuring patient safety and mitigating risk.
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