Faced with a healthcare facility that included independent buildings and car parks, the building owner identified that the current legacy access control solution was coming to the end of its life cycle and was in need of future proofing to provide monitoring of entrances, exits and other sensitive areas ensuring a safe environment for patients, visitors and staff.

Serco Group plc site facilities management company, along with installation and system integrator partner, Check Your Security Ltd conducted a full and comprehensive Enterprise Audit Report of the existing Tdsi, 379 door access control solution. The report provided the stakeholders with a detailed asset register and conditional appraisal as well as highlighting system improvements. It also offered independent advice on the Security Industry trends and key available migration paths.

Utilising cutting edge Tdsi technology for an integrated solution, Serco Group PLC along with installation and support partner, Check Your Security Ltd were able to achieve a 100% performance improvement in the healthcare’s legacy system. By leveraging their initial investment and improving the systems architecture with the latest upgrades, this has shown an increase in daily productivity due to the ease of use of the new Exgarde Management software. The support that could be offered through Tdsi’s local premier partner, Check Your Security Ltd, also based in Norfolk, was of great benefit to the client.

Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital (NNUH) is a National Health Service academic teaching hospital located on the southern outskirts of Norwich and was the first new NHS teaching hospital built in England for more than 30 years. The university hospital replaced the former, Norfolk and Norwich Hospital, which was founded in 1771, and the West Norwich Hospital. The NNUH was built under the Private Finance Initiative (PFI), and opened in late 2001: it has 987 acute beds and offers a wide range of NHS acute health services plus private patient facilities. It is one of the largest hospitals in the United Kingdom in terms of in-patient capacity and is a teaching centre for nurses (adult and children,) midwives, doctors, therapists and operating department practitioners, whilst hosting the Norwich GP speciality training scheme.

Since the beginning, it has concentrated on leveraging the latest technologies to create a digital hospital platform, which has allowed the providers to focus on patient care. In efforts to continually improve quality care, NNUH has deployed one of the most advanced access control solutions available, to ensure the safety and overall protection of its patients, visitors, and staff. The Tdsi integrated system enables NNUH to quickly identify all areas on site, including specific live events where security can respond appropriately, whether this be a suspicious person or hazardous condition, they can react faster and more effectively.

Faced with the key challenge to appraise the current access control system that ranged from old legacy door controllers, network and cabling infrastructure, Check Your Security Ltd utilised their professional service tool - Enterprise Audit Report (EAR) to gather and collate the healthcare’s security inventory and produce a security asset register which highlighted location, condition, value and system architecture design. "The Enterprise Audit Report acted as a blue print to the sites current and future security, providing a greater insight into the past as well as where we wanted to be in the future,” explained Facilities and Services Contracts Manager of NNUH Simon Wardale. "The result: an effective and efficient way to help make informed decisions on the sites security needs.”

At the NNUH, Serco Group plc, (the Facilities Management Company,) were confronted with a challenge of augmenting the site wide upgrade whilst not compromising security and services delivered by the healthcare, making project management particularly difficult at times. To help manage these challenges, Serco Group plc appointed Engineering Officer Steve Hewitt from their Services and Technology team as the overall project manager. His role was overseeing critical paths and to ensure milestones were delivered on time with the correct resources for Check Your Security Ltd to upgrade the Tdsi hardware and software with minimal disruption. "We were delighted to work with a professional organisation such as Serco Group plc, our staff worked efficiently and seamlessly with Serco personnel. It was a pleasure to deliver a high profile project like NNUH on time and on budget.”  Operation Director, Clinton Button from Check Your Security Ltd commented.

According to Simon Wardale, "The latest Tdsi Exgarde Security Management Software 4.2 and hardware now offers the healthcare new opportunities to explore the latest market technologies, and third party integrations. Removing the old S series controllers and moving onto the corporate network has given us the confidence to bring the system on as part of our integrated solutions. The Tdsi system is positively providing our primary goal of monitoring a safe environment for patients, visitors and staff."