Canberra Health Services procured Higgins to provide painting maintenance and reactive works to the Hospital.

The task at hand; uplift the Hospital’s interior using non-invasive methods and products.

The challenge

After the state of the facilities at Canberra Hospital had begun to slide the management arm of the Hospital introduced a comprehensive asset maintenance plan. Within the plan the Hospital staff had scoped for painting maintenance – all of which needed to be delivered with minimal disruption to the ongoing operations.

The main difficulty was unexpected shutdowns - at any time as little as 15 minutes notice was given before one work area needed to be entirely vacant. A scalable, qualified workforce was needed to be able to accommodate the shifting demands of the Canberra Health Services asset.

Solution

Our Canberra team was engaged and began performing works in 2020. Utilising an allocated number of discretionary hours each month, our team of operatives was successful in the delivery of our maintenance painting plan. We have subsequently been engaged to perform additional repainting projects, with the scope varying across wards, clinical spaces, common areas, and waiting rooms.

Smaller teams minimise disruption to the Hospital’s operations. The flexibility shown by our teams has been heralded, as has our constant communication with nursing stations allowing us to perform repaints around high-traffic areas. We provide Material Safety Data Sheets on all products prior to application and allocate hours per floor and building.

Exclusion zones and visible signage keeps pedestrians and staff from entering working areas. Given the active health environment, we utilise Taubmans Pure Performance paint. It is low Volatile Organic Compound (VOC) with minimal odour - making it an ideal choice for interior repainting. It is also synonymous with protection against bacteria and mould and is scuff resistant and highly washable.

Results

We have repainted a variety of hospital spaces with our painting maintenance plan and adhoc repaints. Our operations teams have been complimented on their ability to enable the Hospital's operations to be performed without interference. Despite COVID-19 changing the landscape of working at the Hospital, our painting experts have continued to thrive in this setting.