How to Select a Wastewater Treatment Plant in the Healthcare Sector

Healthcare sector, such as nursing homes and hospitals, generate larger volumes of wastewater and have more complex disposal requirements than other institutions. How can these facilities develop wastewater treatment solutions to reduce disposal costs while minimizing inconvenience to patients and caregivers?

Life in nursing homes and small hospitals can be an endless cycle of health and safety procedures and household routines. The required levels of hygiene and various cleaning challenges result in a constant flow of wastewater contaminated with various detergents, disinfectants, bodily fluids, pathogens, and antibiotics.

How Do healthcare sector Treat Wastewater?

Medical facilities that generate large volumes of contaminated water must request and pay a wastewater disposal permit if they discharge wastewater directly into the public sewer system. For this reason, many require the installation of water treatment plants designed to purify wastewater before disposal.

Many medical and care facilities in rural areas are not connected to the main sewer system at all. These facilities must treat their contaminated wastewater using septic tanks or small treatment plants, ensuring that surface wastewater is adequately purified before being disposed of in the ground.

What are the wastewater treatment requirements for various healthcare sector?

Wastewater treatment plants in nursing homes must be able to treat 350 liters of liquid per resident per day. This increases to 450 liters per patient per day in small hospitals. Compare this to only 150 liters per resident per day in a typical home environment.

This large volume of discharge may be accompanied by unusually high concentrations of chemical oxygen demand (COD), biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), and ammonia. This is due to:

• The presence of antibiotics and other medications
• Large quantities of disinfectants and cleaning chemicals

These contaminants require wastewater treatment solutions capable of handling the large volumes and complexity of the waste being treated.

Motivations for Establishing New Wastewater Treatment Plants in Healthcare Sector

• As the population ages, the demand for new healthcare facilities and nursing homes increases dramatically.
• New medical facilities may seek to install water treatment systems to accommodate their growth.
• Existing medical facilities may seek to upgrade their water treatment processes as their operations continue to expand.

Existing nursing homes in rural areas may already have septic tanks that need to be replaced as they age or demand increases. General regulations often prohibit the replacement of similar septic tanks. Any tank with an equivalent population requires environmental approval for discharge.

Wastewater Treatment Plant Design Considerations for Healthcare Sector

Variable and Surge Loads

The healthcare sector must manage variable and surge loads of pharmaceuticals and other contaminants in wastewater. This requires systems that can adapt to fluctuating wastewater flows without compromising treatment effectiveness.

Emergencies and Critical Conditions

Facilities must maintain continuity of operation in emergencies, such as power outages. This requires systems with robust redundancy capabilities to ensure continuous treatment and compliance with discharge standards.

Compliance Risks

Water companies impose strict discharge limits for COD, BOD, and ammonia; healthcare facilities face significant compliance risks. Ensuring wastewater treatment solutions meet these limits is critical to avoiding penalties while protecting public health and the environment. Choose a supplier with chemical treatment expertise to ensure that fluctuating levels of contaminants can be adequately controlled.

High Discharge Standards

If direct discharges to local water bodies will impact local water bodies, systems must meet the highest effluent discharge standards to protect the surrounding environment and comply with stringent regulatory requirements. Due to changes in regulations and increased pressure from expanded operations, continued use of a septic tank may not be a viable option.

Minimizing Impact

Aesthetics and Environmental Considerations: Choose systems with low visibility and low noise and odor emissions to ensure they do not negatively impact the surrounding area or the quality of life of patients and staff. The system should be integrated, as much as possible, into the natural environment to minimize visual impact. Make sure you choose a supplier with a proven track record of precise, customized designs for complex sites.

Understanding Process Warranty and Lifetime Costs

But what about the lifetime costs of a wastewater treatment system, including installation, operation, maintenance, and potential upgrades? A system may seem cost-effective initially, but if it requires frequent and costly maintenance, it can quickly become a financial burden. Consider the scalability of your solution. How easily can it be expanded as your operations grow, and at what cost? A strong process warranty will give you peace of mind and ensure the system performs as expected throughout its lifespan.

Hospital Wastewater

Hospitals deal with a wide range of contaminants, including pathogens, medical waste, and hazardous chemicals. This makes their wastewater highly complex. Proper treatment is essential for the following reasons:

• Environmental Safety: Untreated hospital wastewater can contaminate water bodies,
• It harms aquatic life and causes ecosystem degradation. The wastewater treatment plant process is critical in preventing this environmental damage by effectively treating and managing hospital wastewater before it is released into the environment.
• Regulatory Compliance: Governments require healthcare facilities to adhere to strict wastewater management standards to ensure public health and safety.
• Reuse: Treated water can be reused for non-potable purposes, such as garden irrigation and drain cleaning, reducing water consumption.
• Infection Control: Effective treatment reduces the risk of pathogens spreading to surrounding areas.

Important Article Explaining The Stages Within a Hospital Wastewater Treatment Plant

Features of an Ideal Wastewater Treatment Plant for Hospitals

Hospitals need wastewater treatment plants capable of treating various pollutants while ensuring operational efficiency. Key features include:

• Advanced Treatment Processes: Hospitals require primary wastewater treatment plants with dual- or multi-stage treatment processes, such as biological treatment and disinfection.
• Significant Reduction in Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) and Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD): A treatment plant must effectively reduce both COD and BOD levels to meet discharge standards.
• Compact Design: Space constraints in hospitals make compact, prefabricated treatment plants ideal.
• Low Maintenance and Cost-Effective Operation: Hospitals often require wastewater treatment plants that are easy to maintain and energy-efficient.
• Odor Control: Odor-free operations are essential to maintaining a healthy hospital environment.

Read Also: Best Practices in Water Treatment in Hospitals and Healthcare Facilities

Conclusion

For healthcare facilities and hospitals, wastewater treatment plants are often the preferred option due to their ability to produce high-quality wastewater suitable for discharge.

The challenge many face is finding partners capable of designing, installing, and maintaining systems in challenging environments that can handle complex chemical discharges.

These systems require design flexibility, ease of maintenance, and consideration of the unique requirements of the healthcare environment.

Partnering with installation and maintenance companies with experience and knowledge of the healthcare sector’s requirements is critical to ensuring system efficiency and compliance.