Abstract
Climate change and wildfire smoke significantly compromise sleep health, particularly in healthcare environments where vulnerable populations such as children face heightened risk. This study proposes wildfire-resilient, sleep health-driven mechanical ventilation control strategies for children's hospitals aimed at mitigating the adverse effects of wildfire smoke on sleep health. A sleep health model linking sleep environment factors to the probability of severe obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) was developed and integrated into a hospital's ventilation control system. Our proposed strategy employs dynamic PM2.5 thresholds to adaptively control the outdoor air changes per hour, optimizing both children's sleep health outcomes and energy efficiency. Through EnergyPlus simulations, our strategy outperformed traditional ventilation methods, reducing the probability of severe OSA by 5.3% to 21.6% and simultaneously achieving notable energy savings. The incorporation of advanced filtration systems, such as MERV 16 and HEPA, was particularly effective in maintaining indoor air quality (IAQ) and sleep health during high pollution episodes. Our findings emphasize the value of incorporating sleep health considerations into mechanical ventilation designs in children's hospitals. Our results indicate that ventilation strategies integrated with a sleep health model and enhanced filtration can improve sleep health and energy efficiency, offering a robust response to wildfire smoke challenges in healthcare environments.