Logistics and Engineering

The food system at the medical center, overseen by Chef Motti Buchbut, employs around 40 kitchen staff who prepare and provide breakfast, lunch, and dinner for a large number of diners, including both patients and staff.

A significant emphasis is placed on meeting the nutritional needs of the patients. The meals are tailored to each patient's dietary requirements with the assistance of dietitians who regularly collaborate closely with the chef and kitchen staff.

Kosher certification: The food served at the medical center is certified as kosher by the "Badatz" Orthodox Union. The hospital's rabbi and kosher supervisor are available around the clock to address any concerns.

Nutrition Services Team: The dietitians at the medical center are responsible for ensuring the nutritional needs of the patients are met and that their diets are adjusted to their conditions and illnesses. Nutrition is considered an integral part of the medical treatment for patients.

Maternity Kitchens: Each maternity department has an open buffet offering three high-quality meals a day. New mothers who are unable to leave their beds are provided with meal trays in their rooms.

Infant Formula Kitchen: This kitchen provides nutritional support for premature infants, infants, and children who are fed with formula during their hospital stay. The infant formula kitchen prepares food supplements, enrichments, and medical devices, including enteral nutrition (administered directly to the digestive system).

Enteral Nutrition: The infant formula kitchen supplies medical food used to enrich the nutrition of the patients and support enteral feeding. It offers enrichments and food supplements to patients who require them based on dietitian recommendations. Additionally, the kitchen provides pureed and mashed foods for patients across various departments who require such diets.

Main Kitchen: This kitchen is responsible for preparing hundreds of trays daily for all departments. Each tray is based on a planned menu determined by the dietetics department's guidelines. Requests collected from the departments, detailing unique menu requirements for patients, are sent to the main kitchen daily. The main kitchen also prepares food for the employee cafeteria and packages meals for departmental teams.

Manager: Chef Motti Buchbut | Phone: 02-6666101

The Communication Center of Shaare Zedek Medical Center handles incoming calls to the medical center and a variety of additional activities stemming from the hospital's needs. The center is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week, except for the appointment scheduling center (see operating hours).

Within the Communication Center, the following key units operate the Medical Center Switchboard, the Appointment Scheduling Center, and the Locating and Paging Center. These units have the role of addressing a range of tasks:

1. Operation of the main switchboard: Receiving incoming calls and routing them to departments/units/clinics/physicians, etc., upon request from callers.
2. Emergency measures activation (emergency calls/code blue).
3. Code activation for resuscitation calls.
4. Reading announcements (evening and night hours).
5. Cell phone system (VPN).

The Appointment Scheduling Center serves the general public for scheduling appointments for outpatient clinics, imaging facilities, and specialized clinics at the hospital. The representatives at the appointment center are employees of the Communication Center and operate as a separate team staffed by a significant number of representatives to provide quick and efficient responses. As part of the service, callers have the option to leave their phone number to receive a callback when their appointment time is near.

Manager: Noa Karmi

The Household Services Department is responsible for various and diverse areas, including cleaning, textiles (laundry and uniforms), transfers, events, and more. The department employs approximately 230 cleaning staff and 15-floor supervisors, responsible for maintaining cleanliness across the extensive Shaare Zedek Medical Center, which covers around 90,000 square meters. Additionally, the department is in charge of maintaining cleanliness at the Nursing School, including its dormitories, for both students and nurses throughout the city.

General Cleaning and Sanitization

The medical center provides medical care for patients, and the role of the Housekeeping Department is to create a pleasant and infection-free atmosphere to promote speedy recovery. Housekeeping services encompass cleaning of hospitalization departments, ambulatory departments, public areas, and more.

Cleaning, Sanitization, and Hygiene of the Patient Environment

Cleaning and sanitizing the patient environment is performed by a specialized team responsible for cleaning, sanitizing, and maintaining the patient environment and medical equipment, with a view to
- Reducing the number of microorganisms that may come into contact with patients, visitors, staff, and the public
- Providing a clean and pleasant atmosphere for both patients and staff.

Advanced technology utilizing ATP is employed to indicate incidences of contamination, and to minimize recurrences.

Textiles (Laundry and Uniforms)

The Textiles Unit (laundry and uniforms) is responsible for processing approximately 7 tons of laundry daily. The laundry is transported in closed and sealed containers to monitored external facilities for cleaning, following which our staff handle the sorting, preparation, and distribution of patient gowns and linens. A new, advanced technology for uniform distribution operates 24/7.

Manager: Imad Aladwein

The Electrical Department consists of two units that work collaboratively:

The Electrical Engineering Unit is responsible for the "strategic" level management and daily maintenance of the hospital's electrical, communication, control, and multimedia systems. 

Under the management of an electrical engineer, the Electrical Unit employs 8 electricians and technicians who handle more than 11,000 requests for troubleshooting or planned operations related to electrical and communication issues each year. These include troubleshooting lighting fixtures and bulb replacement, electrical socket maintenance, nurse call systems, communication centers, telephones, intercoms, fire detection and extinguishing systems, structural control systems, and command systems. The general electrical system of the medical center includes a high-voltage system with four transformer stations, 12 substation rooms, 11 generators, 17 circuit breakers, approximately 900 electrical panels with various power ratings, an energy management system, electrical control systems, lighting and air conditioning control systems for electricity conservation, and Sabbath mode control systems. The electrical engineer establishes the framework for the ongoing maintenance of these systems, which includes service contracts, annual maintenance, and necessary upgrades - setting goals for replacing old panels, circuit breakers, generators, etc., thermographic tests for all electrical panels, and periodic electrical tests in accordance with electrical regulations. We carry out maintenance operations in collaboration external contractors, ensuring coordination and minimal disruption to the hospital's continuous operations. As part of the hospital's development, construction projects are carried out within the existing building, as well as building additions.

The Electrical Engineer's team accompanies these projects in terms of electrical systems, from the programming stage to project completion, closely monitoring project execution, electrical connection, test supervision, and project handover from project management to maintenance, including computerized documentation of all plans and training for the Electrical Unit's team members. For each project, basic operational and safety training is also provided to the medical team responsible for each department. In addition to dealing with high-voltage and low-voltage systems, the electrical engineer is responsible for low-voltage systems, such as nurse call systems, fire detection and extinguishing systems, door control, communication, and camera systems.

Concurrently, there are various projects in which the electrical and low-voltage systems planning is executed by the electrical engineering team. Here too, project supervision continues until the project is handed over for operation and ongoing maintenance. The Electrical Unit team performs routine daily checks on all major electrical systems, including generators – with weekly load operations, annual thermographic tests for all electrical panels, periodic electrical tests at medical sites, reviews of circuit breakers, etc.

Electrical Engineer: Itzik Nahmias
Manager of the Electrical and Communication Units: Ran Waknin

The Mechanical Engineering Department takes care of a wide range of systems and equipment:

• A central heating and cooling facility that provides water to air conditioning systems
• Sanitary water systems
• Treated water systems
• Piping for sterile supply (ASME) and for the kitchen
• Medical gas systems, including liquid oxygen reservoirs
• Heavy equipment for operating rooms (tables, examination tables, lights, booms)
• Washing machines for surgical instruments and autoclaves with sterile supply
• Heavy equipment in the kitchen (dishwashers, conveyor belts)
• Dozens of washing and grinding machines for pots
• Dozens of patient lifting devices
• Dialysis water systems
• Engineering projects in various fields (air conditioning, installation, medical gases, energy conservation, etc.)

The Biomedical Engineering Department is responsible for the lifecycle management of medical equipment. This includes providing technological consultation to staff and management prior to equipment acquisition, overseeing the purchasing process, installation, performing periodic maintenance, troubleshooting issues, and ultimately decommissioning the equipment. The department operates continuously to integrate new technologies to enhance and improve the quality of care.

The team comprises over ten employees with diverse technological backgrounds who manage the various devices spread across different medical center sites, including Shaare Zedek Medical Center, Bikur Cholim Hospital, Yad Sarah, and Hadassah Ein Kerem.

The department utilizes a maintenance software that centralizes equipment databases, service requests, and periodic maintenance tasks.

The Department addresses thousands of service and repair requests each year. Most of the equipment is serviced and repaired by department technicians, while the remaining devices are handled through service contracts with authorized companies. The department maintains a partial inventory and spare parts warehouse with thousands of items, facilitating swift repairs and ensuring the continuous operation of all devices.

The department's personnel undergo both domestic and international training to meet the necessary qualifications. They work as a cohesive team to support medical staff and patients.

Manager: Dror Levi

The department provides the medical staff with the appropriate equipment and tools to enable the delivery of high-quality professional care. The department prides itself on offering courteous, professional, and efficient service to both internal and external stakeholders.

Areas of responsibility of the warehouses at Shaare Zedek Medical Center include:

- Supplying medical equipment, chemicals, office supplies, textiles, food, and more
- Constructing inventory structures tailored to the needs of the Medical Center in each of its divisions
- Maintaining adequate stock levels of all items based on needs and ensuring the readiness of emergency inventory according to directives from the Ministry of Health and the IDF
- Managing central warehouses
- Supervising and controlling the movement of equipment and supply items
- Providing equipment to all hospital departments, including wards, laboratories, machines, clinics, and offices

Manager: Mr. Gideon Ozeri

The Sterile Supply Department at Shaare Zedek Medical Center prepares surgical kits, sterile sets for delivery rooms, trays for catheterization rooms, respiratory equipment, and more. The department employs a permanent team of 25 workers who engage in cleaning, sterilization, packaging, and sterilization in autoclaves and plasma.

In recent years, Shaare Zedek has become one of the largest surgical centers in the country, and its state-of-the-art operating rooms are among the most advanced in the world. Instrument sterilization is a crucial and central aspect of hospital operations. The new system operates as an advanced production line, utilizing robotics and fully supervised by a computerized system. There is complete physical separation between the three process areas: the collection area for non-clean equipment with sorting, cleaning, and sterilization, the sterile area for packaging surgical kits and sterile sets, and the area handling instrument sterilization, storage, and distribution to all hospital departments. This separation is designed to prevent errors and situations where non-sterile items "leak" into the clean area.

Sterile supply contributes to the community by providing employment opportunities for workers with special needs, in addition to regular staff members. Volunteers who have become integral parts of the department's team also assist us.

The activity of the Sterile Supply Department constantly increases in pace with the hospital's growing activities, with the department's workload rising by 10% each year. The future plan for sterile supply involves creating customized surgery kits (CASE CARTs) based on the type of procedure.

Team Leader: Mr. Nadav Rubinovich