Many former behavioral health patients remember a common experience: being transported to a treatment facility in handcuffs. Vulnerable, hurting, and desperately in need of healing, these patients received an unintended message that they were dangerous and criminal.
Various protocols and building configurations are in place at all stages of the treatment process both to maintain safety and minimize risk of harm, but patients are often caught in the tension between therapy and safety.
Maybe you’ve heard about the latest research scandal of a retracted paper in the journal Science. It was a fascinating study about changing minds, and I heard an interview with the study team on the radio show This American Life one Saturday while doing errands. As a researcher, it was one of those parking lot moments where you sit in the car because it’s just such an amazing story—and about research!
While Lean planning and operations have most often been applied to large hospitals, Lean can also have a positive effect on primary care clinics.
Lean eliminates waste, streamlining resources and improving workflows to provide exemplary patient services. By emphasizing flexibility and adaptability, Lean is especially useful for healthcare organizations that must anticipate changes in medical technology, procedures, care models, and reimbursement standards.
Karolinska Institutet was founded in 1810 and is one of Sweden’s oldest medical universities. The organization has been studying NICU medical practice, planning, and design since about the time neonatal medicine officially came into existence in the 1960s.
The Center for Health Design has been working with organizations for years to advance the practice of healthcare design. But lately, I’ve been hearing more and more about how the process is broken: There’s no time. Everything has to be done faster, cheaper.
I don’t think it’s just the economy or healthcare reform. As our use of technology has progressed, we now live in an instant world. We expect immediate responses to content that’s 140 characters or less.
The patient room is one of the most important areas of any hospital, so it rightfully deserves plenty of design attention. After all, it’s the patient room that embraces patients in their weakest moments and, if designed correctly, can aid them in a speedy and relaxed recovery.
Born out of the need to expand its women’s, children’s, and cancer services previously spread across three miles and two campuses, the new UCSF Medical Center at Mission Bay in San Francisco is the nation’s first integrated project of its size and scope—the 289-bed, six-story, 878,000-square-foot complex is home to three specialty hospitals.
The U.S. healthcare system faces a looming shortage of physicians in the coming decade, with a deficit of up to 90,000 projected by 2025. The baby boomers have begun to retire and their generation’s declining health will further strain the system by increasing the demand for care. A growing concern of high physician stress and burnout is compounding the problem.
As competition surges among healthcare providers, delivering positive experiences for patients is inspiring projects that breathe new life into care spaces. But simultaneously, organizations are turning their attention to areas of the hospital that likewise improve staff and family satisfaction, and few spaces hold the potential to achieve this that the cafeteria does.
For years we’ve been designing the administrative C-suite to provide proximity for healthcare executives to foster collaboration and efficient decision making.
Are healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) driven not only by existing harmful pathogens but by the absence of helpful species? In our zeal to create an ultra-clean patient environment, are we actually removing ecosystems that can help heal?
