Ask HRC: Fire Door Assessment Checklist

An Healthcare Risk Control (HRC) System member recently wrote to us asking for an assessment tool to allow an objective observation of each fire door in the facility, from gaps to hinges. Although HRC does not have a specific assessment tool for fire doors, we offered the following advice, including a checklist of issues to consider when evaluating fire door safety.

A good fire safety door inspection is necessary to determine if a facility is in compliance with Joint Commission standards, local building codes, and the authority having jurisdiction over fire safety (e.g., fire marshal). This should be done via a comprehensive examination of a facility's fire doors. While a checklist is very helpful, it does require the person conducting the inspection to have some basic knowledge of fire doors and the appropriate terminology. Modeling a fire door safety checklist on the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) fire door safety standards contained in NFPA 80 is important, but certain aspects of the list must reflect requirements of a particular facility's local codes. The following checklist, drawn from NFPA 80 and NFPA 101,...