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Life Safety Compliance

Life Safety Compliance

Monitor and ensure compliance with life-safety systems and regulations.
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VLogicFM offers you powerful tools to prepare for life-safety code compliance and accreditation surveys. Use VLogic platform to host and maintain your life-safety drawings, components database and mitigation tasks. Use VLogic’s innovative inspection Apps to automate inspection of fire doors, dampers, exit signs and other critical components.

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“Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony.”

- Albert Einstein



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Life safety standards are designed to protect lives and property from the risk of fire and similar hazards. In healthcare, the bulk of life safety standards are derived from two codes published by the non-profit standards body, the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA). These codes are: NFPA 101 Life Safety Code (LSC) and NFPA 99 Health Care Facilities Code. The NFPA standards are regularly updated in response to new building techniques and occupational patterns. Government agencies such as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) adopt these LSC changes in periodic rulings.

Complex Standards Requirements

Together, NFPA 101 and NFPA 99 add up to 853 pages of specific rules and standards that healthcare facilities must comply with to retain certifications from auditing entities such as the Joint Commission (TJC).

The Life Safety Code (including NFPA 99) pays close attention to two main types of systems:


 



1. Building Systems
  • Architectural structure
  • Mechanicals (HVAC)
  • Electrical
  • Plumbing
  • Gas & vacuum
  • IT & Communications
2. Fire Prevention Systems
  • Fire compartments, walls & doors
  • Smoke barrier zones
  • Hazardous material mitigation
  • Automatic sprinklers
  • Fire extinguishers
  • Alarms

Facility managers and compliance officers are charged with ensuring that both types of systems, including their many components, are compliant with the Life Safety Code standards for each of the 12+ building occupation categories covered by the code. The task is complex and highly detail oriented.

For smaller hospitals, where facility managers double as compliance officers, the task of managing day-to-day facility operations AND ensuring LSC compliance can be overwhelming. Periodic compliance surveys make this task even more difficult due to the detailed compliance reports required for all of the systems listed above.

VLogicFM Life Safety Solution

VLogicFM’s software architecture is built on a foundation of accurate as-built architectural and utility CAD drawings. This foundation is linked to data-rich layers of software intelligence for enhanced facility management capabilities.


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Drawings-centric Architecture

This drawings-centric architecture is uniquely positioned to help enhance life safety management requirements, because life safety management tasks are also highly dependent ondrawings accuracy.

Specifically, VLogic’s life safety portfolio includes the following software solutions and professional services:

  • VLogicFM Fire & Safety software module
  • VLogic Life Safety Drawings services
  • VL Inspect iPhone/Android app
  • VLogicFM As-built software module
  • VLogicFM Space software module
  • VLogicFM Utilities software module

The following table details how VLogic’s software and services offerings help compliance officers and facility managers with their efforts to ensure Life Safety Code compliance for their building and fire prevention systems:



VLogicFM Life Safety Solution


VLogicFM Fire & Safety software + Life Safety Drawings services

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  • Display accurate life safety CAD drawings of fire prevention systems
    • smoke barriers/zones, sprinkler systems, etc.
  • Link individual system components to life safety CAD drawings:
    • fire extinguishers, control valves, exit signs, fire alarms, etc.
  • Rapidly discover components with advanced searches that display results in lists AND directly on the floor plan drawings.
  • Enhance maintenance and speed up problem resolution with the ability to see connections between components:
    • Example: show connections between shutoff valves and connected components
  • Simplify onboarding of life safety drawings to VLogicFM with integrated life safety CAD drafting services provided by VLogic’s internal team
  • Life safety drawing services is also provided on a project-basis, separate from the software, in support of customer or partner Life Safety Code Surveys (formerly Statement of Conditions Surveys).

VL Inspect Mobile App

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  • Use VL Inspect mobile app to move your fire door inspections into the 21st Century
  • The paperless process saves time and helps the environment
  • All standard reports are already on the app, no need to carry around loads of paper forms
  • Automate field inputs with QR code scanning and pre-populated drop-down menus
  • Streamline reporting workflows by skipping transcription steps with real-time field inputs
  • Ease data sharing with exports to portable Excel or PDF formats.

VLogicFM As-built software, VLogicFM Space software, & VLogicFM Utility software

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Users can leverage VLogicFM’s As-built, Space and Utility modules to aid in the compliance effort—especially for showing structural and building systems compliance on the actual architectural & utility as-built drawings:

  • Fast, secure, 24/7 access to critical as-builts CAD drawings from anywhere.
  • Confidently rely on drawings accuracy during compliance surveys due to unlimited update services integrated into SaaS subscriptions.
  • Easily share any CAD drawing from anywhere or even remotely, with smart device/browser interfaces and flexible access controls.
  • Boost drawings usability with a software intelligence layer linked to the drawings
  • Assign risk assessment or occupational category designations to each space.
  • Enter compliance surveys with confidence, knowing that all of your facility drawings are accurate AND within easy reach, upon TJC surveyor requests.

Frequently Asked Questions

Absolutely. VLogic’s life safety drafting team is well versed in developing life safety drawings in collaboration with life safety code consultants and in-house teams. We can upload to VLogicFM or provide as stand-alone CAD drawings at the customer’s discretion.

Yes. VLogicFM was designed for this scenario. Facility Managers can show any VLogicFM-based drawing from their iPad, smart device, or laptop, including life safety drawings. The VLogicFM Fire & Safety module goes one step further and shows the connections between drawings components, or shows color-coded smoke zones, etc.

Yes. VLogicFM links life safety intelligence (data fields) to the individual spaces on the drawings, which allows you to display space by its characteristics. For example, display color-coded spaces by risk level, space function, occupation type, etc.

Yes. The app-based form is the same as the paper-based form. The only difference is that you can answer the question much faster with pull-down menus on the app than physically writing them on paper. Plus, you don’t have to transcribe the app form, like you have to do for the paper form.

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