Most hospitals are drab, dreadful factories of misery and melancholy.

Massive, inhuman in scale and orientation, spirit-crushing for patients and staff alike. Sterile sealed boxes that configure and reinforce inflexible and outdated healthcare facilities, systems and outcomes.

Our monolithic model of hospital design helps no one but private equity and private corporations looking to squeeze a few extra bucks from an ageing and collapsing healthcare system. Profits are always put ahead of people and patients.

Over the past decade, private equity firms like Blackstone, Apollo Global Management, The Carlyle Group, KKR & Co. and Warburg Pincus have deployed more than $340 billion to buy hospitals and health operations. Patient health is the last thing on their mind. It’s always about making the most money. Not taking the best care of patients.

It’s time to design and build better hospitals for better patient outcomes. Time to use architecture to make people feel better, heal better.

Most hospitals make people feel powerless. But there’s no reason why they can’t be designed to empower people through design, color, texture, circadian rhythm. So they can be more supportive rather than disorienting and demoralizing.

Design hospitals to radically improve patient experiences, clinical outcomes, staff wellbeing and wider health and social care. More humane and flexible spaces for both patients and staff with generous views, awash with natural light and set amidst green parks.

Hospitals designed to lift our spirits. Hospitals as welcoming wellness resources rather than forbidding fortresses of sickness and despair.

Suspended gardens and balconies with trailing and climbing greenery ensure every patient has access to green space. Rooftop gardens grow the fresh produce for healthy patient meals and on-site cafes.

Such biophilia and sensory engagement connect us to life, to our natural rhythms, our daily ebbs and flows. Plants will draw in wildlife, sunlight will rise and shadows fall.

Engaging the senses engages patients to life. We can see and feel the day progress. We can go out onto a pocket garden and smell the lavender.

We can hear the singing of birds rather than the beeping of machines.

References

“How do you design a better hospital? Start with the light” Wired (2022)

“Private equity firms now control many hospitals, ERs and nursing homes. Is it good for health care?” NBC (2020)

“Better design, better hospitals” Canadian Medical Association Journal (2016)