Public Invited to Comment on Draft 2018 FGI Guidelines

The Facility Guidelines Institute  invites users of the FGI Guidelines to comment on its draft 2018 documents, posted for public review. Input from the field is critical to revising the Guidelines documents, which provide fundamental standards for design and construction of hospitals, outpatient facilities and residential health, care and support facilities.

The multidisciplinary, 100-member Health Guidelines Revision Committee, the body responsible for the content of the Guidelines, revises and updates the text every four years to keep pace with changes in the healthcare and residential care fields and to clarify the requirements to make compliance easier. “Although we are only in the middle of revising the FGI Guidelines documents, HGRC members have been putting forth a yeoman’s effort to verify the need for existing requirements and validate newly proposed language,” said Douglas Erickson, FASHE, CHFM, CHC, HFDP, chair of the 2018 HGRC. “Now we need users of the Guidelines to review the draft documents and provide comments, supportive or constructive, for consideration by the HGRC during the final stages of developing the 2018 documents.”

The 2018 Guidelines revision cycle will yield three Guidelines documents—for hospitals, for outpatient facilities and for residential health, care and support facilities. Therefore, three drafts have been created, as well as an electronic comment system for each book. To learn more about the comment period, to access the draft and to link to the three comment systems, visit http://fgiguidelines.us10.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=5a251caea681d8758065cb74c&id=f934bc8cc2&e=0f60de9fa4.

The public comment period will close on Dec. 12. Comments may be made only on proposed changes to the text (deletions, revisions or new material) in the 2014 FGI Guidelines for Design and Construction of Hospital and Outpatient Facilities and Guidelines for Design and Construction of Residential Health, Care, and Support Facilities. Following are some of the changes proposed for the 2018 FGI Guidelines documents:

Hospitals and Outpatient Facilities

• New guidance on design of telemedicine spaces
• New design requirements for accommodations for care of patients of size
• Clarification of procedure room and operating room requirements: procedure types, facility types, hybrid ORs
• New classification structure based on procedures performed and patient acuity for determining imaging room requirements
• New flexibility in pre- and post-procedure patient care area design requirements
• Two options for sterile processing area design: two required rooms (decontamination and clean) with an exception for a single room for small tabletop sterilizers
• New design requirements for a sexual assault forensic examination room
• Revised mobile/transportable medical unit chapter
• Updated acoustics requirements
• Expanded sustainability requirements re: waste minimization, potable water and energy efficiency
• Revised guidance for emergency preparedness and management (formerly provisions for disasters)

Residential Health, Care, and Support Facilities

• Updated acoustics and lighting requirements
• Updated minimum requirements for grab bar configurations to align with the latest research
• New chapter on settings for individuals with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities
• New chapter on long-term residential substance abuse treatment facilities
• New telemedicine section to address the increasing provision of telemedicine services in residential facilities
• Language shift from “bariatric resident” to “person of size” since people who need accommodations include those who are not necessarily obese or receiving treatment for obesity, such as very tall people

Commenters are asked to provide their take on the costs and benefits of any changes to the draft text they submit, using an optional cost/benefit comment box and a required cost/benefit matrix provided in the comment systems. The FGI Cost/Benefit Committee will review all comments and make recommendations to the HGRC.