The influence of human movement on the transport of airborne infectious particles in hospital

Abstract

The impacts of human movement on the distribution of airborne infectious particles in hospital environment are investigated numerically. In the case of airborne infection isolation room, the influence of different walking speeds on the distribution of respiratory droplets is investigated by adopting the Lagrangian method for tracing the motion of droplets, the dynamic mesh model for describing human walking and the Eulerian unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes model for solving the airflow. In the case of operating theatre, the impact of surgeon bending movement on the distribution of bacteria-carrying particles (BCPs) is investigated by using a similar approach, except that the drift-flux model is used for modelling BCPs distribution. The adopted models are successfully validated against reported experimental data. The results show that both walking speed and bending posture change considerably the suspended droplets concentration in a room. The key factors regarding the simulation techniques are discussed.