The use of modular operating theatres for modern surgery.

Abstract

were pre-fabricated, and equipment was built into the walls. Panels were fitted together using a gasket to seal the joints. Veller, a manufacturer of medical engineering products, marketed the system complete with its own equipment. The obvious disadvantage was that doctors and surgeons often preferred their own choices of instruments, so the market was limited and confined mainly to France. Sales were aimed at upgrading old operating rooms. In the late 1950s, Mr. Denis Melrose, of London’s Hammersmith Hospital, designed a pre-fabricated operating room in co-operation with a small engineering company called New Electronic Products. (The company was later acquired by Honeywell Controls.) Mr. Melrose’s design was based on an igloo shape, but, due to manufacturing problems and cost, an octagonal shape was finally produced. Being a surgeon, Mr. Melrose was well aware of the urgent need to upgrade operating rooms because of the high incidence of cross infection being experienced in traditional theatres in the United Kingdom and overseas, and his design’s success was immediate: the first Honeywell Modular Theatre was installed in Hammersmith Hospital in the early 1960s. Between then and 1968, sixty-five Modular Operating Theatres were sold and a new concept established in operating-room design. Construction was based on a light frame, with 800 mm-wide modular panels of laminated construction, with a melamine suface and polystyrene core on a wood frame, forming the walls and ceiling. Jointing was carried out using a gasket system. Equipment was mounted in the walls, giving surgeons a greater working area, and access was from the rear ideal for servic-