Modelling for understanding of COVID-19 spread and design of an isolation room in a hospital

Wu, X., Abubakar-Waziri, H., Fang, F., Dilliway, C., Wu, P., Li, J., Yao, R. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4269-7224, Bhavsar, P., Kumar, P., Pain, C. C. and Chung, K. F. (2023) Modelling for understanding of COVID-19 spread and design of an isolation room in a hospital. Physics of Fluids, 35 (2). 025111. ISSN 1070-6631 doi: 10.1063/5.0135247

Abstract/Summary

We have modelled the transmission of coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) in the isolation room of a patient suffering from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS CoV 2) at the Royal Brompton Hospital (RBH) in London. An adaptive mesh computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model was used for simulations of 3D spatial distribution of SARS CoV 2 in the room. The modelling set-up is based on data collected in the room during the patient stay. A number of numerical experiments have been carried out to provide an optimal design layout of the overall isolation room. Our focus has been on (1) the location of the air extractor and filtration rates; (2) the bed location of the patient; and (3) consideration of the health and safety of the staff working area.