Department of Veterans Affairs
VA Handbook 7610 (252)
Washington, DC 20420
June , 2006
E.
Nuclear Medicine Services and PET/CT services, as used in these criteria, include
the diagnostic imaging modality of Nuclear Medicine Services and PET/CT services.
F.
Room capacity per year should be based on:
Operating days per year x Hours of operation per day
= Number of
Minutes per procedure / 60 minutes
annual procedures
1. The general planning model for VA facilities assumes 250 Operating Days per
Year and 8 Hours of Operation per Day. Room capacity will fluctuate as hours of
operation are modified, i.e., additional capacity may be generated by extending
the daily hours of operation within the same physical setting.
2. Basic room use efficiency factor is 80%
a. Modalities with routine, scheduled procedures and backup equipment (more)
than one piece of the same type of equipment in the department) should plan
for an efficiency factor of 85%.
Example: Assume a modality room that averages 30 minute per
procedure/suite stop:
250 operating days per year x 8 hours of operation per day
= 4,000 annual
30 minutes per procedure / 60 minutes
procedures
A maximum capacity of 4,000 procedure/suite stops per year, assuming
100% utilization. However, 100% utilization is not realistic to achieve, thus, it
is not an accurate design standard. Apply Room Efficiency Factor:
4,000 x 80% = 3,200 annual procedures.
TABLE 1: WORKLOAD PARAMETER CALCULATION
AVERAGE
ANNUAL
MINIMUM
LENGTH OF
PROCEDURES
WORKLOAD TO
PROCEDURE
PER ROOM
GENERATE ONE
PROCEDURE
(minutes)
(rounded)
ROOM
Nuclear Medicine
75
1,280
400
Scanning Room
Bone Densitometry
20
4,800
1,440
Room
PET/CT Scanning
45
2,130
640
Room
The number of annual procedures per room will be used as a criteria
parameter to calculate the number of procedure rooms in the Space Criteria
Nuclear Medicine Service (Chapter 252): Page 6 of 18
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