Features - Healthcare Design & Management

5 key considerations for hospital relocations

It’s no secret that the Coronavirus pandemic has shined an unrelenting light on hospitals, exposing areas that were previously latent and thrusting them into public consciousness. Most significantly, perhaps, the pandemic has exposed the urgent need for hospitals to modernise and expand facilities, exemplified by the temporary Nightingale units that cropped up in major cities across the UK. With increased media attention, expanding services, and the quest to house more-innovative technologies and equipm...

Linoleum: The optimal flooring for healthcare settings

It is well-documented that depression, stress, and anxiety can all have a detrimental effect on health and recovery. With this in mind, specifiers within the healthcare industry are now paying more attention to the atmosphere created through design, opting for brighter and more-inviting décor and finishes to help patients, staff, and visitors feel more relaxed and calmer. However, creating such environments is not an easy task, as furniture and interiors must also stand up to the rigorous standards of hy...

Dementia-friendly design: Better care homes for supported living

James Botterill, director at HSSP Architects, is a specialist in designing homes for people living with dementia. Here, he looks at how care facilities can be designed with dementia-friendly principles in mind

Maximising hardware value in a cost-driven environment

Regardless of cost, safety should always remain top priority, and inadequate door furniture compromises that. Quite quickly, cheap solutions can reveal themselves as low value, high-risk options and so decision makers must look towards providing higher-quality, long-term solutions with branching value benefits. Futureproofing projects In construction terms, futureproofing is described as the process of optimising design and construction to account for change and to maximise the value of a building. To ef...

How healthcare construction can benefit by investing in quality assurance

The construction industry has a long-standing problem when it comes to waste, remaining the largest user of materials in the UK and generating an estimated 120 million tonnes of construction, demolition, and excavation waste every year. As such, a focus on greener building is driving decision making in every aspect of the built environment. It’s also a concerning fact that build quality inconstancy has plagued construction for years. The healthcare sector, which possesses the UK Government’s largest...

Five key considerations for hospital relocations

When we worked with Heartlands Hospital in Birmingham, we relocated X-ray files which were stored in a basement only accessible via a spiral staircase. We also had to make sure all records stayed in chronological order. Double down on security Part of a successful healthcare move relies heavily on how effective the administration side of the hospital is delivered. This includes paper and digital records which must be kept secure, confidential, and intact. For paper records, we take an extensive audit an...

A new approach to care home design

“And all artwork has been carefully curated to ensure it has enough negative space to be easily deciphered.” Maintaining everyday skills The first floor will house the dementia accommodation and facilities, including the kitchen pantry and the winter garden. “These areas are designed to give residents tactile experiences and will allow maintenance of everyday life skills,” said Bernard. “In the kitchen pantry, there will be a fully-functioning kitchen, encouraging residents to get involved with supervise...

Features

Designing for extra care: What can COVID teach us?

Older people choosing extra care are looking for supportive environments beyond their front doors. Supporting sustainability Sustainability isn’t only about environmental performance. There’s a housing shortage across the UK and one way of addressing this is to encourage more movement in the market. Offering older people improved options for later living can help create a more-sustainable housing market. Extra care housing schemes must meet users’ aspirations and this is about rightsizing rather than do...

Dementia and mental health design best practice comes under the spotlight

They worked with James Leadbitter, creator of Madlove: A Designer Asylum, an approach that blends research, design, building ,and exhibitions to reimagine how mental health facilities could look. Christian said: “When it came to the engagement process, there was a strong feeling from some patients and their parents that they didn’t want the unit to follow the trend of being homely and domestic. “Spaces needed to be comfortable and functional, but service users still needed to know they were in a place of...