5 ways PKL can ease your hospital kitchen problems

In this post, John Steward, Manager of our Long Term Hire Division, blogs about our temporary hospital kitchens.

As PKL’s hospital kitchen hire specialist, I have extensive experience of arranging temporary kitchen hires for hospitals. There are many reasons why a hospital may require temporary kitchen facilities, such as during planned refurbishments or emergencies such as fire or flood.

Kitchen facilities play a vital role in hospitals and I know the unique set of challenges faced by hospitals requiring temporary facilities. With that in mind, I’ve addressed the top 5 challenges and concerns that hospitals often come to us with when they need temporary kitchen facilities.

I hope this post will give you an insight into how we can help hospitals. Please feel free to get in touch if you’d like to discuss your requirements of if you’d like me to prepare a free bespoke kitchen contingency plan for you.

1.    Specialist Kitchen Facilities
From my experience working within the acute care hospital sector, I know that many hospital kitchens have to produce food to specific dietary requirements. The exact facilities required can vary from hospital to hospital, and is vitally important for the health and wellbeing of patients.

We have a fleet of over 10,000 items of catering equipment and can work closely with hospital catering teams and dietary staff to provide each hospital with a temporary kitchen facility which is matched with the menu requirements. In the past, our specialist facilities have included temperature-controlled prep areas for the preparation of high risk meals, as well as facilities for the sterilisation of crocks and utensils.

2.    Noise and Disruption on Site
No hospital wants teams of shouting workmen on site, mess and dirt everywhere or roads blocked for hours on end. That sounds like a nightmare to me too, so you’ll be pleased to know that we have polite, efficient drivers and engineers who are able to deliver our units at times to suit you, including evenings or weekends if preferred. We also plan delivery and installation in advance, which means our experienced team can get facilities installed quickly and efficiently, causing minimum disruption on site.
 
3.    Quality and Reliability
When your staff and patients are relying on kitchen facilities to keep them well-fed, you’ll want to be sure that these facilities aren’t going to let you down. Not only are our kitchens purpose-built units designed specifically for catering use, they also contain commercial catering equipment which consists of trusted, professional brands. All units and items of equipment undergo thorough, regular maintenance to prevent breakdowns, and we can also supply our facilities with back-up generators which will kick in should power be lost, keeping the kitchen running without disruption.

4.    Safety and Compliance
New clients often have questions about the suitability and safety aspects of portable kitchens, so here’s the info you need to know. Our kitchens are manufactured to the highest standard and incorporate the latest health and safety features. Features include a ventilation canopy, auto gas shut off, automatic fire suppression system, easy clean extraction system, infestation-proof construction, 500 lux lighting level, food-safe plastisol steel wall lining, non-slip safety flooring, and insulated fire regulated wall panels, ceilings and floors. Our kitchens also have food-safe wipe clean walls and stainless steel catering equipment, providing a hygienic, easy to clean food preparation environment.

5.    Support and Service
I know that hospital kitchens are used from first thing in the morning to last thing at night, so we offer a level of service to support this. Our service and technical support lines are open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and we can dispatch an engineer immediately should a kitchen emergency occur. Additionally, an engineer will be with you within 24 hours of all standard service callouts, and any minor matters will be attended to as soon as we have an engineer in the area.

Temporary Kitchen and Dining for Hospital Refurbishment

PKL has supplied a complete kitchen and restaurant facility to North Middlesex University Hospital (NMUH) to provide temporary catering facilities during a major re-build of the hospital.

As part of an £80m PFI project, NMUH is undergoing a major building programme that will renew around half of the Trust’s estate and co-locate all of its services within a single, state-of the art facility.

The Trust was keen to minimise disruption to those areas of the hospital that remain operational, so provision of high quality catering facilities was a key criterion. From the very early planning stages of the project, PKL worked closely with catering provider Medirest (part of Compass Group) and main contractor Bouygues UK, to understand their needs and to ensure the temporary structure met those requirements.

“This is one of the best temporary kitchen and restaurant facilities we have ever had” said Medirest Contracts Manager Dominic Donylal. “Customers are amazed at the quality of the facility when they enter the restaurant area and experience the bright, cheerful environment. It’s easily as good as many high street restaurants,” he added.

Dining facilities within the complex include a main restaurant with hot and cold serveries and a Deli Marche coffee shop area. The retail unit can seat over 100 people at any given time. These areas are served by a full open plan production kitchen with separate cold storage, dry storage and potwash areas.

There are also separate food preparation areas for the staff restaurant and for the preparation of food going to the hospital wards. The latter uses Medirest’s innovative Steamplicity steam pressure cooking system, which maximises the taste and nutritional value of the food.
Ancillary facilities include customer toilets, staff changing and showering facilities and an office area for restaurant management. Each section of the restaurant and dining complex was pre-fabricated at PKL’s production facility and delivered to site in modules for assembly in situ.