BovenIJ hospital opts for smart fire safety system

The new, highly digitalised fire alarm system at the BovenIJ hospital in Amsterdam ensures reliable notifications, thereby promoting a sense of calm within the hospital. The system is fully integrated into the hospital's emergency response team and paves the way for predictive maintenance.

Willy Frits, head of the engineering department, believes it is important for the department to retain control. Together with the construction coordinator, the Facilities Manager, and the engineering firm Promaint, he developed a long-term maintenance plan and standard specifications for the uniform execution of projects. Technical staff are involved in projects from the start, so that they can maintain the systems later on and the knowledge remains within the hospital. “In the event of malfunctions or incidents, we must ensure within the first half-hour that the primary process continues to run,” Frits explains. “That’s why we don’t want to be overly dependent on external partners, and it’s essential that we know our own systems well.”

False alarms

The hospital’s previous fire alarm control panels generated many false alarms, which led to anxiety and alarm fatigue. Staff increasingly chose to stay put when an alarm sounded, assuming that nothing was actually wrong. Frits: “Recertifying our fire alarm control panel threatened to become a costly and complex process, with no guarantee of success.”Het BovenIJ is one of 14 Amsterdam healthcare institutions that, together with the Amsterdam-Amstelland Fire Department, have signed the Healthcare Fire Safety Covenant . This marked the start of a risk-based approach to further improve fire safety. “That was the reason we decided to replace the system early, even though it hadn’t yet been fully depreciated. We chose Siemens because of their smart technology.”

Our current detectors can be precisely adjusted remotely to prevent false alarms. This makes the alarm system more reliable.

Willy Frits , head engineering department, BovenIJ hospital

Verify notifications via app

Image BovenIJ hospital Willy Frits and Eric Hendrikman

Willy Frits, head of engineering department BovenIJ and Eric Hendrikman, projectmanager fire safety at Siemens in front of the new fire safety system.

Siemens introduced the Fire Connect app at BovenIJ. When a fire alarm is triggered, a select group of emergency response team members (ERT) and technical staff are first alerted to serve as initial responders. They can see in the app which room the alarm was triggered in and can assess the situation on-site. False alarms can be reset via the app, with geofencing ensuring that this can only be done by technical staff and emergency response team members who are physically present in the hospital. In the event of a genuine alarm, a manual fire alarm is activated, after which the other emergency response team members are summoned and an evacuation, if necessary, begins. “By working with these ‘scouts,’ we minimize disruption and allow our healthcare staff to focus entirely on their care duties,” says Frits.

Siemens monitors all fire safety system data in the cloud and detects alarm levels in the backend that haven’t yet been noticed within the hospital itself. If a detector is close to an alarm threshold, the cause is immediately investigated. “We used to get a lot of false alarms, for example due to steam in the central kitchen or when administering nebulizer treatments to asthma patients,” explains Frits. “Our current detectors can be precisely adjusted remotely to prevent this. That makes the alarm level more reliable. We’re in constant communication to further improve this. This also prevents the fire department from having to come by at least twice a year for inspections. Responsibility for fire safety increasingly lies with the end user.”

Above the standard

Driven by this sense of responsibility, BovenIJ has also revised its fire safety policy in parallel with the renewal of the fire safety system. After all, fire safety goes beyond just the installation. According to Annex C of NEN 2535, doors must close automatically upon a fire alarm to prevent the spread of smoke and flames. At Frits’ request, only the doors in the relevant department now close, rather than all doors as was previously the case. Additionally, the hospital received approval from the inspectorate for a partial deviation from the standard: the magnets on hermetic doors in the OR complex are not automatically de-energized upon a fire alarm. This prevents people from potentially being unable to exit safely. Frits: “Hermetic doors are heavy; not everyone can open them manually. That is why we chose not to de-energize them. The standard specifies the minimum level of fire safety, but from a patient safety perspective, we sometimes make different considerations and go a step further. For example, we’ve installed strobe lights in the operating rooms to alert the surgeon in the event of an alarm. That way, we prevent an emergency response team member from entering during surgery to report that there’s a fire.”

No disturbance

During the renovation of the fire safety system, care staff and patients were not to be inconvenienced. From the moment the contract was awarded, Siemens was responsible for both the old and the new systems. “We replaced the existing detectors step by step,” says Eric Hendrikman, fire safety project manager at Siemens. “First five a day, then ten, and eventually more. It’s important to think things through carefully in advance, plan thoroughly, and execute in partnership; otherwise, it causes a lot of disruption. We first conducted pilot projects to test our approach.”

Certification

The fire safety system was certified in March 2025. For Frits, this is a testament to quality and a reward for the hard work of both BovenIJ and Siemens. “We knew it would be a major undertaking. Fire safety is embedded in many sub-systems that first had to be decoupled. For example, in the event of a fire on the first floor, the elevator must not go there, and access control on doors must be temporarily disabled. But what do you do about access control for medicine cabinets? We had to make clear agreements on that.” Siemens will also remain involved in future projects, such as renovations, to ensure that fire safety is properly addressed. Frits: “This is how we maintain the high level of fire safety together. Ultimately, one thing is paramount to me: the safety of healthcare providers and patients.”

Disturbance free testing

One year after completion all detectors are tested by using the conventional method: with a test probe. As digital services continue to roll out, the hospital is switching to Disturbance-Free Testing (DFT), in which detectors test themselves. This causes less disruption to the primary process. Hendrikman: “Through a report, we can demonstrate which detectors have been tested and how they performed. As a result, the inspection agency does not have to check everything thoroughly, but only a portion of it, which significantly reduces the inspection time.”

Risk-based security

The new fire safety system is a flagship of modern fire safety. “In the past, you’d install a detector and that was it,” says Hendrikman. “Now, the detector provides intelligence. This allows us to work together in accordance with the Fire Safety in Healthcare Covenant toward risk-based fire safety: not static, but proactive and focused on continuous improvement. The digital capabilities also pave the way for predictive maintenance.”

Not finished yet

Willy Frits is satisfied: the staff at BovenIJ have regained their confidence in the fire safety system, which brings a sense of calm and security to the hospital. Still, he believes the project is not yet complete. “Now we’re going to continue fine-tuning! Employees need to be aware of the environment in which they work and know what to do and what not to do in the event of a fire. We’ll continue to work on that continuously in the coming years. Follow-up is often overlooked in projects, but we do things differently. In fact, we’ve only just really gotten started with this project.”

April 2026