The future of construction procurement in the UK: a shift to service provision

Procurement is a process and observable phenomenon entwined both culturally, politically and practically into the fabric and history of the construction industry. Historical reviews have highlighted recent changes in procurement systems which reflect the developments within the industry as a whole. This development is argued to be influenced mainly by a myriad of inter-connected contextual drivers and issues both internal and external to the industry. Ability to adapt to change via a comprehensive understanding of these inter-connected issues is a prerequisite for the industry to better meet the requirements of the society and deliver added value to the customers. This paper reports on research findings which identify procurement issues and trends from past construction reports and uses these issues as a foundation on which to build future scenarios in the area of construction procurement. Future scenarios constructed by experts in the area of construction procurement are also presented. The scenarios depict two polarised paradigms, namely ‘free market’ and ‘intervention’, which will largely determine the future state of the industry. The scenario of health care provision suggests a developmental shift from infrastructure production to service provision, and highlights the importance placed upon delivering end user value. Future work will validate these plausible scenarios and develop an interactive simulation tool based on system dynamics (SD) principles to assist practitioner’s in their decision making

Synergising disaster risk management and construction research: a multi-disciplinary initiative from the UK

Many scientists believe that the magnitude and frequency of extreme events is escalating and in so doing will increase the vulnerability of the built environment. This paper discusses the synergies between three ongoing research projects being conducted at Loughborough University, the University of Salford and the University of Reading. The "Big Ideas" project aims to identify and understand the challenges, issues, drivers and barriers for the UK construction sector over the next 10 to 20 years. This work is being complemented by Loughborough's "PRE-EMPT" project and research being undertaken on behalf of the RICS Presidential Commission for Major Disaster Management. Mutually, these three projects form a basis for a deeper understanding of the future of both construction and the environment in which we live and work. The synergies between these projects will ultimately provide trans-disciplinary suggestions for how the industry and society can better prepare itself for any unforeseen eventualities

The applicability of radiative transfer models for atmospherically correcting airborne hyperspectral data in Antarctica

<p>As part of a collaborative project between BAS, DRDC Suffield (Canada) and ITRES Research Ltd., (Canada) the first known airborne hyperspectral dataset was acquired over the Antarctic in February 2011. The simultaneous deployment of commercially available visible-near infrared and shortwave infrared spectrometers generated a dataset covering 0.35 to 2.5 µm spectral range at a spectral resolution of 9.6-14 nm. To enable quantitative analysis of surface properties using imaging spectrometry data the removal of atmospheric absorption and scattering effects is an essential pre-processing step. The implementation of a sufficiently accurate and robust atmospheric correction methodology is of critical importance in ensuring that the results from spectral and spatial analysis algorithms are as accurate as possible. However, whilst methodologies are well established for most environments, there is currently no published methodology for correcting airborne hyperspectral data in the Antarctic region.</p> <p>This study presents initial results from an investigation into the applicability of the MODTRAN-5® radiative transfer model and the ATCOR-4 atmospheric correction package for producing atmospherically corrected hyperspectral data in the unique Antarctic environment; an environment that is cold, dry and has low levels of aerosols and atmospheric pollution. Initial results from radiative transfer modelling and atmospheric correction produce absolute reflectance spectra which are partially comparable to laboratory measured spectra. Improvements are seen with the hybrid approach of radiative transfer modelling and the empirical line method using in-scene ground targets. Residual noise remains present due to absorption by atmospheric gases and aerosols which are not appropriately modelled for this environment. Overall, this demonstrates that commercially available packages are not currently flexible enough to correct Antarctic hyperspectral data without the addition of in-scene ground calibration targets. The implementation of Antarctic aerosol and atmospheric profiles into the radiative transfer model would likely improve these corrections and remains an area of investigation for future hyperspectral campaigns in the region.</p

Irish National ICU Audit Annual Report 2017

By the end of 2017, the Irish National Intensive Care Unit Audit (INICUA) run by the National Office of Clinical Audit (NOCA) covered 58% of Intensive Care Unit (ICU) activity in adult Health Service Executive (HSE) funded hospitals (12 Units in nine hospitals) and all ICU activity in both specialist paediatric hospitals in the Republic of Ireland (ROI).</div

Irish National ICU Audit Annual Report 2021

INICUA captured activity in 22 adult public hospitals, which collectively provided 96% of Level 3 ICU care in adult HSE-funded hospitals in 2021. The ICU audit documented 12,151 admissions of 11,420 patients to 26 Units in 22 hospitals. The mean length of stay was 6.6 days. Data in this report provides detailed insights into the complexity and volume of care provided in each Unit, with implications for resource requirements when planning ICU services. A key metric in defining the complexity of care provided is the number of bed days where the Patient is undergoing invasive ventilation. The Report provides data for each Unit on (i) the total number of bed days with invasive ventilation and (ii) bed days with invasive ventilation as a percentage of total bed days.</p

Irish National ICU Audit Annual Report 2018

This report is based on data from 18 Units in 15 hospitals which undertook 70% of all critical care activity in Health Service Executive (HSE)-funded hospitals during 2018. Units varied widely in numbers of beds, numbers of admissions, and in case mix on admission to the Unit. Some Units were High Dependency Units (HDUs), some were Intensive Care Units (ICUs), some were mixed ICU/HDU, and some were specialist Units (e.g. neurosurgical, cardiothoracic). Our data provide a detailed insight into the characteristics of each Unit and allow Units to benchmark themselves against comparable Units. In addition, the data allow comparisons between Units in Ireland and those in the United Kingdom (UK).</div