Kristina Bertocchi, AIA, NCARB, Project architect and healthcare planner, DesignGroup (Columbus, Ohio)

Growing up in the rust belt of western Pennsylvania, Kristina Bertocchi witnessed and felt the impact of many of the effects of behavioral health and substance abuse disorders.

Attending The Ohio State University (OSU; Columbus, Ohio), she initially set out to pursue a job in the medical or educational field. But after enrolling in her first architecture class, she found a career combined her passion for uplifting the disenfranchised with her ability to create meaningful spaces.

Graduating with her bachelor’s degree in architecture, she next enrolled in graduate school and began an internship with DesignGroup, where she was hired as a full-time project associate in 2020 and promoted to project architect in 2023.

During her time with the firm, she’s become a vocal advocate for trauma-informed design, particularly in behavioral health and oncology spaces—including as a lecturer at OSU’s Knowlton School of Architecture for the past four years. She has also given presentations on trauma-informed design internally at DesignGroup, as well externally at conferences.

Through her efforts, she helps staff and clients understand the philosophy and physiology behind stress and emotional responses.

Bringing these ideas into practice, she served as the lead medical planner and designer on a new 23-hour behavioral health observation center in Knox County, Ohio. Here, she incorporated intuitive site and building wayfinding, thoughtful patient flows, spatial designs based on the understanding of bodily protection, and sensory mitigation practices.

Additionally, she’s worked on two large-scale campus master planning exercises for major health systems in Ohio, including future planning for The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center after the completion of its inpatient tower in 2026. In each of these projects, she developed data visualization tools that helped the clients understand decisions graphically to promote clarity and understanding.

As the planning, design, and technical leader for a highly complex linear accelerator addition at OhioHealth’s Dublin Methodist Hospital in Dublin, Ohio, she balanced the responsibilities of medical planner with those of the technical architect.

Additionally, as lead medical planner on a confidential cancer project in Northeast Ohio, she helped to create respite for patients undergoing chemotherapy, orienting infusion areas to exterior amenities, and advocating for the agency of a patient to choose either private spaces or more active group zones depending on their emotional needs.

On every project, Bertocchi references her core principles: Destigmatize mental health and use evidence-based design to create spaces that alleviate the effects of trauma, clarify and improve clinical flows and operations, and are safe and productive.

Path to healthcare design: I have always loved the challenges and rewards of a career in architecture. Unfortunately, I realized quickly that broadly most architectural design—such as single-family homes, boutique hotels, and high-end corporate offices—was reserved for a specific socio-economic bracket of individuals. Healthcare design has been my path to creating spaces for a broader, more diverse group of people.

Describe your design approach: Thorough listening, broad exploration, and thoughtful simplification.

On your desk now: I’m balancing a few projects in distinctive design phases, two of which include a behavioral health crisis center for Behavioral Healthcare Partners in Knox County, Ohio, and a large-scale planning project for The Ohio State Wexner Medical Center.

Most rewarding project to date: I love working for a client who is very mission motivated. My most rewarding project was probably Muskingum Valley Health Center’s Cambridge location, a rural health clinic that provided wellness services to a previously underserved population. The project included women’s health, pediatric services, dental, vision, and primary care.

I was early in my career and acting as a project coordinator. It was my first experience having responsibility for creating materials that are required to run design meetings. This taught me the value and limitations of certain representation strategies and how to truly craft the message for the user to understand.

Their passion for providing care to their community was the driving factor for the staff and, of course, I wanted to help them achieve their goal.

What success means to you: A successful project is a project that meets all expectations and realities provided by a client and at the same time utilizes design techniques that create a refinement and clarity of forms and functions to the occupants.

If the design does not add to the stress of the patient, or even provides a moment of reprieve, I would consider it a success. Personal success is about being clear with yourself about your goals and priorities (and what they are not) and finding peace in the long, never-ending process that it takes to move toward them.

Industry challenge on your radar: I would like to see the healthcare design industry begin to purposefully incorporate trauma informed design (TID) practices into a broader application of projects. TID uses specific devices that studies suggest may help alleviate the symptoms of a person who has experienced trauma. These devices need not be limited to behavioral health applications but can be extended into the design practice of the entire field.

Must-have skill for healthcare designers today: Communication! And that includes listening. An architect should be listening and leading in every project. Because of this, continuing to strive for more clear and purposeful communication, both verbally and graphically, is necessary.

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