Abstract

In order to respond to pandemics such as COVID-19 in spaces vulnerable to airborne infections, such as emergency hospital wards, various forms of temporary negative pressure isolation (TNPI) have been proposed. While research on the infection control performance of TNPI has been conducted, its impact on indoor environments has not been sufficiently investigated. Against this background, this study aims to examine and evaluate the impact of TNPI’s performance parameters on indoor environments in emergency hospital wards. TNPI’s performance was classified into three categories: infection control, comfort, and indoor air quality, based on previous research, and the evaluation parameters of infection risk, pressure difference, and temperature were analyzed. The analysis revealed that an air flow rate of approximately 12ACH was required to satisfy the required standard of 2.5 Pa in negative pressure isolation room guidelines, and the temperature difference between TNPI and the outside was at most 2.3 degrees Celsius. This demonstrates the need to consider the impact of TNPI on other indoor environments in addition to its infection control performance when evaluating TNPI performance.