The 2018 and 2022 Hospital and Outpatient Guidelines documents do not include any requirements for operating room doors, but an authority having jurisdiction wanted to apply Section 2.1-7.2.2.3 (4) (Doors and door hardware—Door hardware) to the OR doors in an ambulatory surgery center. This section is in the common elements chapter of both documents and states, “Lever hardware or push/pull latch hardware shall be provided.”
The language in NFPA 101: Life Safety Code is more specific and requires doors that open into an egress corridor to be self-latching with positive strike hardware. The NFPA 101 commentary clarifies that “treatment rooms [which include ORs] within a suite are not required to be separated from suite circulation space by corridor walls and latching doors.”
An erratum has been published for the 2018 and 2022 Guidelines editions stating that omission of a door latch is permitted where ORs are located in a designated suite and do not open to an egress corridor.
Find the updated errata sheets at fgiguidelines.org/guidelines/errata-addenda.
