Anne DiNardo

Since I started covering healthcare design more than a year ago, I’ve become much more observant during any doctor's appointment or hospital visit. Basically, the concerned family member in me is asking questions about medications and growth charts while the editor in me is trying to uncover all the details that designers and architects have put into a facility.

What type of flooring did they choose? How does the layout of this waiting/family/patient/exam room add or detract from my experience? Is there access to natural light?

James J. Peters VA Medical Center (Bronx, N.Y.), the oldest VA facility in New York City, needed to upgrade its electrical distribution system to maintain its accreditation and remain open. The project included replacing up to 400 circuit breaker panels and installing five back-up generators, and required the electricity to be turned off for different parts of the hospital for long periods of time.

“This is an exciting time for healthcare,” said Sarah Dash, research fellow, Georgetown University's Health Policy Institute, as she kicked off the first Healthcare Design Academy event of the year in Washington, D.C.

Ambulance bays connect EMS personnel and their patients to the triage area of a hospital and should be fast, safe, and efficient at getting everyone in, and out. Yet not all bays are created equal, and oftentimes they become a dumping ground for excess supplies and waste, or a holding area for backboards waiting to be cleaned before they can be used to transport patients again.

In this series, Healthcare Design asks leading healthcare design professionals, firms, and owners to tell us what’s got their attention and share some ideas on the subject.

With a background as a sociologist and design strategist, Lance Carlson leads the strategies practice at Taylor (Irvine, Calif.), a full-service architectural, interiors, and strategies firm. Here, he shares his thoughts on service design, brand positioning, and the merging of healthcare with other market sectors.

Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center completed an 80,000-square-foot multispecialty clinic in Green Township, Ohio, in 2013. The building houses nine clinics and 17 services and is designed to bring area children a comfortable and positive healthcare environment that’s close to home.

Stanford Children’s Health (Palo Alto, Calif.) is a growing community physician and sub-specialty group, developed in partnership with owner Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Stanford and the Stanford School of Medicine. 

Ambulance bays are the front door for many at a hospital. However, the design and operation of these essential spaces can be less than ideal for patients, staff, and EMS personnel alike.

In this series, Healthcare Design asks leading healthcare design professionals, firms, and owners to tell us what’s got their attention and share some ideas on the subject.

Healthcare designers, architects, facility owners, and contractors and used to lengthy schedules and spending large amounts of time on a project that won’t see its first patients until 2016, 2018, or beyond.

One deadline that might seem far off—but in reality is just 16 months away—is June 2015, the final date for the industry to transfer to using the new LEED v4 rating system.

In a study conducted by Nurture in fall 2013, 35 percent of clinicians and nurses reported being injured at least once on the job—the bulk of those injuries coming from patient transfers. Nearly half of the 303 survey recipients said they were responsible for performing patient transfers more than once a week.