Poole Fire Protection is providing fire protection and life safety design for the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System to replace the Intensive Care and Surgical Step-Down Unit at the Southeast Tucson VA Clinic in Tucson, Arizona. This project includes construction of approximately 16,350 SF of new building space for Medical Intensive Care Units (MICU) and Step-Down Units (SDU) patient rooms to replace nine existing MICU beds and 12 SDU beds currently located on the second floor in Building 38 and Building 57 respectively.

The project will be constructed at the second-floor level (on stilts), the lower level will be backfilled in future standalone projects.  The reason is to keep Intensive Care Units and Step-Down Units (ICU/SDU) beds on the same level as the Operating Rooms (OR) and Post Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU) suites which are located in Building 57 on the second floor. Patient care support spaces (pharmacy, lab, nurse station, medicine rooms, etc.), storage, administrative spaces, staff lounge and toilets will be constructed. Coordinated phasing for minimum disruption while maintaining acceptable emergency egress as well as access to the medical center must be achieved.

Fire protection work includes review meetings, fire suppression (including preliminary hydraulic calculations to ensure water supply adequacy), fire alarm (with voice evacuation), and design analysis in compliance with VA Fire Protection Design Manual. Deliverables will include code/life safety drawings, fire alarm and fire sprinkler drawing development and specifications.