Established: 1983 Staff: 10 Location: New Haven, Conn. Healthcare Markets: Acute Care, Alternative Medicine, Behavioral/Mental Health, Education/Research, Long-Term Care, Pediatric Care, Sports Medicine, Women's Health Services Services: Consulting, Evidence-Based...
HCD Guest Author
HCD Guest Author's Latest Posts
Designed according to Vastu
Site location and development aren't always a matter of zoning, occupancy, and financing. In some areas of the world, they are a function of profound religious and philosophical beliefs. Case in point: the planning and design of Dhaka Apollo Hospital in Bangladesh....
The fallacy of ‘revenue-generating’ space
All my recent healthcare clients have declared a desire to focus their capital expenditures on “revenue-generating” space, meaning the portion of their facilities associated with diagnostics, procedures, or inpatient stays. The idea is that in times of increasing...
Beyond traditional treatment: Establishing art as therapy
I couldn't understand why an important hospital like Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis would hang abstract art in its halls, waiting rooms, and patient rooms. I was confused by it, and so was my 85-year-old mother, who had been admitted for Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. I...
Everything flows
Installing custom water features in healthcare facilities requires much more care in engineering than installations in other facilities. Bluworld approaches installations in healthcare facilities a bit differently than in other environments. We are aware of special...
A Restorative Environment
The intense and stressful healthcare workplace environment continues to challenge healthcare leaders in their efforts to improve staff recruitment and retention. According to an April 2005 news release issued by the American Nurses Association (ANA), a report released...
The Integrated Operating Room
Integrated operating rooms (I-ORs), when optimally designed, can lessen the complexity of the most complicated environment in the hospital—the surgery suite. User-friendly, integrated technologies augment surgeons' skills and help the entire surgical team work more...
Safety Versus Aesthetics
Safety of patients and medical personnel is a hot button of concern among healthcare institutions. Patient falls, infection control, medication errors, and errors made during patient hand-offs are just a few of the areas of focus. Particular attention is being paid to...
Innovations in Modular healthcare
Curry Health Network, which serves rural communities on Oregon's south coast, decided earlier this year to replace the outdated facilities at Curry General Hospital in Gold Beach. Like many hospitals, it planned to continue treating patients in its original buildings...
Ecological intensive care
As Mother Nature offered up a wonderful bout of late-summer sunshine this past September, a group of healthcare providers, suppliers, designers, and others convened in Hackensack, New Jersey, to examine the ecological status of our healthcare system. The result was a...
The ecology of the patient visit: Physical attractiveness, waiting times, and perceived quality of care
In 2004, the United States spent more than $16 billion for hospital construction, an amount that is forecasted to rise to more than $20 billion by 20101 A significant proportion of this construction is for ambulatory facilities, marking a major shift from a focus on...
Who’s number one?
Recently I heard a business consultant allude to the business philosophy of Southwest Airlines—in so many words, “With us, our customers come second.” Customers second? Who's first? According to Southwest, “number one” is staff. Since Southwest is the most (if not the...











