A third of fire incidents at a Lanarkshire hospital in line for replacement have “gone unreported” meaning corrective action was not taken, an official report found.
NHS Lanarkshire said 30 per cent of alerts at Monklands Hospital had not been recorded over the past three years by staff, and said a failure to investigate was leaving the health board open to criticism from the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service.
At least 10 incidents are said to have occurred at the Airdrie hospital over 2020/21 which went unreported, after health board officials cross-checked fire alarm alerts with reports.
According to the health board, none of the incidents at Monkland led to an actual fire and were due to the “actions of patients” or electrical appliances.
In October 2020, patients in three wards at another Lanarkshire hospital were evacuated after a fire broke out in an intensive care unit treating patients with Covid-19.
Emergency patients were diverted from Hairmyes to other Scottish hospitals, while the patients in ward one, where the fire started, and from the adjacent wards, were moved to other parts of the hospital.
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The incident is said to have left 21 members of staff at risk of contracting Covid.
The fire was one of 141 incidents logged in Lanarkshire hospitals from April 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021. Of those only four were actual fires, with the majority logged as “unwanted fire alarm”.
The highest number of alerts were caused by steam, smoking, burnt food and accidents by hospital contractors.
On July 7, 2020, a fire broke out in a critical care unit at Hairmyres after food in a staff microwave overheated and caught fire.
The number of fire related incidents in Lanarkshire hospitals was down 18% on the 172 reported the previous year. The decrease was attributed to reduced footfall as a result of the pandemic.
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However the health board added: “It should be noted that the total number of fire incidents quoted may not represent a full and accurate figure for reporting period 2020/21.
“After cross-referencing the number of fire alarm activations recorded by University Hospital Monklands (UHM) Switchboard Staff with the number of fire incident Datix Reports, it was estimated that 10 fire incidents which occurred at [Monklands] during reporting year 2020/21 were not recorded, as required by section 4.10 of NHSL Fire Safety Policy.
“This is the third successive year this issue has been identified.
“NHSL Fire Safety Team have raised the issue... advising it is a matter of concern as unreported incidents are not investigated, corrective action is not taken and it leaves the Board open to criticism from the Enforcing Authority.”
A spokeswoman for NHS Lanarkshire said: “NHS Lanarkshire takes its fire safety responsibilities very seriously.
“This report identified that internal documentation was not completed locally, however the hospital and NHS Lanarkshire were aware of these unreported fire related incidents. None of these were an actual fire.
“Fire incidents analysis has identified that these are primarily associated with the actions of patients or electrical appliance use.
“NHS Lanarkshire works closely in partnership with Scottish Fire and Rescue Service to reduce the number of fire alarm incidents and to continually improve the level of fire safety across all our sites and routinely review procedures following an incident of this nature.”
The Scottish government last month approved Wester Moffat as the site for a new Monklands Hospital.
Gartcosh and Glenmavis were already being considered when Wester Moffat was identified through a public site nominations process run by the health board.
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