The Green Hospital: Design Evolution or Common Sense?

Simple this one.

If you get a cold or flue you stay home rather than go to work.

It will take the same amount of time to recover, more or less, but at home you are more comfortable.

Speaking from experience and as someone who suffers from clinical depression, when I am in my cubicle, three days a week, I am somewhat less then in a good place.

When I am at home during the rest of the week, I am on top of the world, it is the comfortable space. Making the work place/recovery space as comfortable and welcoming as possible makes healing less stressful for the patient, and maybe easier and quicker, maybe.

Having been employed in various departments in health care over the years I can say confidently that the homey designs have more to do with the staff's well being than the patients and the appearance and environment of the structure are used for marketing to get the patient to choose the facility BEFORE the real need for admission arises.

Once admitted and in the healthcare process the patient will return only if the experience with the staff was a positive one. Very few patients venture out of their rooms and explore all the marvelous green spaces and indoor waterfalls.

I agree with Dances with trees on the "Simple this one," as well as your dad.

'Green' in its purest sense is to "do not waste any resource."

This can be summarized as reduce, reuse, recycle.

Reducing materials required is common sense.

Reusing materials for this type of application in their prior use form probably does not make sense in light of the hospitals life or death urgency mission.Do i want the electricity to be reused wire that might get nicked in removal and reinstall??? This too is common sense.

Recycling of used building materials and trying to use materials that have a minimum impact when ultimately disposed seems to be common sense.

However this all begs the question, whats the point of trying to create a homey spiritual design of your processes and practices interrupt the patient with an obligatory temperature taking pulse taking and wake up at 3AM? Note the vitals on the instruments and don't wake/bother them!

Also, hospital wards are very noisy. And allowing some administrator to walk the floor clacking noisily in her city girl shoes while chatting loudly to an associate does nothing for the healthybody and spirit of the poor souls trapped in the hospital by their need for treatment. At times, a machine shop is quieter than some wards in the hospital.

All this green design for hospitals is is window dressing, rather than substance.

Changing practices, not wall paper, will make a difference. Unless you want to validate it as Hawthorneeffect ( not the TV SHOW!)

milo " This is not the first time that I have found myself agreeing with your father. Tell him I said "Good Thinking.""