In today’s video, I explore how a patient room within a hospital can be designed as a narrative made up of a patient’s behaviors. By being able to orchestrate room elements within a hospital design’s patient room, you as an architect can bring building elements to foster healing by tapping into both the patient’s cognitive and behavioral processes.

As you watch this video, think of how you might tap into the resources with such a room, so that they coordinate with one another — yielding elements that are much more aesthetic, comfortable and effective — as they pull from each others strengths.

Video Transcript

00:10 Maria Lorena Lehman: This is Maria Lorena Lehman with SensingArchitecture.com. In this video, I’m going to talk about occupant experience, specifically looking at healthcare architecture and a recovery room for a patient, so the patient will be our occupant in this example. As you can see here, I’ve already drawn a very, very rough diagram of a typical patient room that you might typically see. In this upper hand corner, left-hand corner, might be a restroom area. Over here in the upper right hand corner might be a window with hopefully a view of some trees or nature. On this wall might be paintings or interactive video displays or televisions. Of course, this is the patient bed or central point where the patient spends most of their time. And we also have an area for visitors, which is all very important. And this, of course, is our main entry and exit into and from the room.

01:32 MLL: Now as you can see, there is already a narrative going on within this patient room. The patient has different activities with which they need to be involved, both things that they want to do and things that their medical team and doctors are prescribing them to do, usually to help them heal and keep their spirits up while within the hospital. Some of the things that are important for you as an architect to understand when designing for your occupants in this manner might be hierarchy and timing in conjunction with your occupant needs. And of course, as I said before, their needs might be what they want and what the medical staff thinks they should want and need.

02:35 MLL: And all of this leads them on their path to recovery. I think it is here where architecture often misses a beat, where the overall architectural solution tries to share all of these requirements and activities within one space. But what I think might be most interesting for you as an architect is to track the patterns in a story-like fashion where, for instance, with timing at certain times in the day, a patient might need to engage in activities of daily living. They may need help getting to and from the restroom. At other times of day, they may need more time for contemplation or peaceful thinking where looking at the view of nature has actually often been found to help patients heal. At other times of day, they may need distraction to watch television or interactive video displays, but similarly, the video displays could also serve to inform them and teach them how to take care of themselves and prepare them for their trip home. Likewise, visitors can be allowed in at certain times.

04:33 MLL: So the room is usually, today, in a one-size-fits-all standard state. But with transient architecture, I wonder how we can pull resources together within a room to really make each activity sing. For instance, the interactive television display might actually serve to teach them or inform them with activities and exercises so they can get better and more independent over time and begin to engage more readily in their activities of daily living.

05:37 MLL: So the idea here would be for you as an architect to begin to pull the different resources within the room; like the restrooms, televisions, interactive displays, views of nature, spaces for contemplation, visitor areas, patient bed, and of course, this involves room lighting, flooring, wall materials, ceiling materials so that they might become transient and work together in an orchestrated fashion to help emphasize certain elements within a room at certain times when the patients need it most. And this might help them to recover faster and better.

06:19 MLL: Thank you for listening. This is Maria Lorena Lehman with sensingarchitecture.com.

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© 2008-2011 Sensing Architecture by Maria Lorena Lehman

Image photographer: Charles Davis Smith | Architect: RTKL Associates Inc. | Healthcare Design

It is no secret that hospital patients are influenced by their surroundings. Hospital design directly impacts patient health – in more ways than one might think. Today hospital designers are trying to evolve hospitals beyond their infamously sterile décor. Care is being taken to use color, nature and wayfinding to ease a patient’s hospital stay. The following are five ways hospital design influences patient health – where care should be taken to improve patient recovery.

1) SENSE OF PLACE:
In the paper, Is there a Psychologist in the Building by Christian Jarrett, hospital layout is listed as quite an important factor for patients. Going beyond simple signage, hospital patients should be able to have a sense of their location without ever feeling lost. It has been found that having a sense of place helps keep patient stress levels down.(1)

2) PRIVATE ROOMS:
Also important to hospital design is the frequency of private rooms in a hospital. Providing private rooms reduces medication error and falling instances.(1) I’m sure you can imagine that private rooms also make for better visiting with patients and their loved ones.

3) NATURE + ARTWORK:
Hospitals that include nature and artwork are providing for more positive patient experiences. Both nature and artwork contribute to patients having a greater “sense of well-being” where spaces lend themselves toward contemplation and feeding the senses.(1)

4) NOISE:
A major problem within hospitals today is noise. Often patients cannot sleep through the night as medical carts screech through the halls and doors open and close. Hospital designers should pay greater attention to acoustics within hospitals as noisy environments generate more stress for patients. Also, sleep is critical for patient recovery.

5) COLOR:
Use of color in hospital design has a multitude of uses. Color can help patients have a sense of orientation – where color is used to give different hospital areas a sense of place. Also, color has been known to be associated with mood. Using the right colors in waiting areas, examination rooms, hallways or patient private rooms can have a definite affect on patient motivation and stress levels.

All in all, progress is being made to design better hospitals. Much study and research is now underway to more completely understand what patients truly need. So often, it is the patient that never gets their needs heard during the design process. For this reason it is nice to know that healthcare design is now getting more attention and making improved headway.

(1) Jarrett, Christian. Is there a psychologist in the building?. The Phychologist. Vol 19 No 10. October 2006.

© 2008-2011 Sensing Architecture by Maria Lorena Lehman