Exploring the Condition of Wards in Malaysia Hospital Buildings

Hospital buildings condition necessitated the findings of this study especially the state of the wards in the hospital buildings. The objective of this study is to examine the conditions of the wards in the hospital buildings, and proffer recommendations to various stakeholders for enhancement. A quantitative approach was used where the condition of the hospital wards was ranked respectively by the participants were physicians, psychologists, dentists, veterinarians, medical doctors, medical officers, nurses, and other hospital buildings professional users constitute the sample stratum. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 25 was used to analyse the data; descriptive and inferential such as reliability, validity, and ranking. The salient finding is that polluted ventilation, faulty ceiling lamps, faulty fire alarms, faulty wall (wall finishes/painting) and faulty window handles, were the condition of wards that were ranked highest (slightly bad) and merely affected. This implies that there is the need to use a better maintenance management approach to avert further decline in the condition of the hospital wards. Also, the research findings states that hospital buildings conditions and components of wards could be in the good state at all times using a holistic approach that will reduce more wards component depreciations for quality services outputs for the users. The wards conditions in the hospital buildings could be greatly improved by using proper strategies and maintenance management plans. Most of the studies about hospital building wards had focused on thermal comfort, but there is a paucity of studies that investigate the hospital buildings' condition of wards with low number in respondent active participation. Despite the constant rise in maintenance costs, there are numerous complaints and critiques of hospital buildings reported in the media. The lack of proper consideration for maintenance management and weaknesses in Malaysia hospitals has led to the deterioration of hospital buildings and reduced healthcare services. The study was being able to highlight some beneficial qualities and were also highlights some weaknesses of wards condition in the Malaysian hospital buildings which can tentatively be curtailed so users can be comfortable and satisfied

Sustainable housing practices in housing development in Malaysia towards establishing sustainability index

This paper present the housing development processes aimed at applying sustainability principles specific in Malaysia context by drawing the experiences from exemplar projects in other countries and comparing them with the development needs under local conditions. The complexities of the projects do require compliances of project management best practices to achieve the goal of sustainable housing development. At the same time, this research is to identify the project critical success factor for application in the project management implementation in term of best practice to realize the goal of sustainable housing development. Sustainability Index is established with purpose to generated values into figures for the sustainable housing development that are used to characterize or evaluate specific aspects of the system through the assessment of housing sustainability indicators. The formula of sustainability index in housing development will be established accordingly. The parameters or variables based on the identifiable indicators of the success factors will be established with reference to the designed and practices of the green building rating system that had been adopted in Japan, United Stated, United Kingdom and other countries

Review of critical success factors affecting Malaysia's construction industry's sustainable health and safety practices

Purpose – Contrasted with some other industries, the construction industry has been linked with the most noteworthy accident occurrence rate, the majority of which has been related to poor health and safety practises. This paper therefore sets out to conduct a comprehensive review of the critical success factors that can aid sustainable health and safety practises on construction sites in Malaysia. Design/methodology/approach – The review focussed heavily on published reports, drawn between the years 2000 and 2022. The Scopus database was used for gathering the articles reviewed for this study. Findings – After reviewing various literature studies, a total of 106 critical success factors were identified. All these factors were then categorised under the three pillars of sustainability. A total of 48 factors were grouped under the economic factors, 37 factors were grouped under the social factors and the remaining 21 factors were grouped under the environmental factors. Originality/value – This paper conducted a comprehensive review of the critical success factors for bridging sustainability and health and safety. This study will help in developing a sustainable health and safety model that can drastically reduce the accident rate on the construction site

Appraisal on Workforce Performance towards Industrialised Building System in Perak, Malaysia

The workforce has always been the backbone of the construction industry in the Industrialised Building System (IBS). Previous researchers often obtain data and opinions from the perspective of construction professionals and often neglect the labour workforce opinion. This study aims to investigate various factors that affect the workforce's productivity in IBS performance. The data collection amounts 60 targeted respondents. This study found a strong correlation between motivation, education, and workforce skill level that affects productivity in implementing IBS. The resolution is to propose an improvement of monetary incentive and academic level of the workforce. Keywords: Workforce; Industrialised Building System (IBS); Construction Industry; Malaysia eISSN: 2398-4287© 2021. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians/Africans/Arabians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v6i18.306

Perception of Lecturers and Students Regarding the Illuminance in the Lecture Theatres and Tutorial Rooms: Case Study in Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR)

Even though artificial lighting is widely used nowadays, it has several negative impacts on human health. Therefore, this paper reported research that comparing the illuminance level in the learning environment in UTAR and recognizing the users’ insights on the illuminance level. Lux meter and questionnaires were used for data collection. Questionnaires were administered to 312 respondents. The results show that the illuminance level in some of the tutorial rooms is too bright and left on even when the rooms are empty. From the descriptive analysis, it is found that almost all the respondents are satisfied with the illuminance level in both research venues. Based on the t-test, it is found the significance for pair 1 and pair 2 is greater than 0.05. Hence, there is no similarity between both research venues. Pair 1 is about the lighting condition preferred by the respondents, while pair 2 is about the condition in both research venues which includes the existence of glaring vision, headache, eye tiredness, and conditions that affect student performance. This paper concludes by suggesting that individual switches be provided for each of the bulbs

A comparative analysis of construction workers’ mental health before and during COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria

Purpose – Because of the sort of working environment and the nature of construction jobs, a high rate of poor mental health has been recorded in the construction industry. The aim of this study is to compare construction workers' mental health before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria. Design/methodology/approach – A survey questionnaire was developed and administered online to building environment professionals working on construction sites. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics such as mean and standard deviation. An independent sample t-test was also conducted to determine whether there was a significant difference in the mean before and during the COVID-19 infection. Findings – The results show that mental health challenges were more prevalent during the COVID-19 pandemic compared to before the pandemic. The result of the independent sample t-test revealed that there exists a significant difference in all the mean before and during COVID-19 except sleeping too much or too little; having low or no energy and lack of emotion that shows no significant difference. Originality/value – This study is the first to compare the mental health of construction workers before and during COVID-19 in Nigeria. The significance of this study was that it would provide an insight for construction managers and other decision-makers on the most critical mental health challenges on construction sites, which will help in an attempt to improve the mental well-being of construction workers

A Framework for Assessing the Sustainable Urban Development

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to propose a framework for rating sustainable practice in the urban development by reviewing some selected assessment tools in various countries around the world. For instance, CASBEE of Japan, LEED of the USA, Green Mark of Singapore and GBI of Malaysia. These tools adopted different methodology, however, their common goal is to measure the sustainable performance. The review will identify key factors for developing a framework for sustainable practice that will take some criteria into. This paper will propose a framework for rating sustainability of urban development for further testing in the local context