Open building and flexibility in healthcare: strategies for shaping spaces for social aspects.

INTRODUCTION: The fast development of technology and medicine influences the functioning of healthcare facilities as health promoter for the society, making the flexibility a fundamental requirement. Among the many ways to ensure adaptability, one that allows change without increasing the building's overall size is the Open Building approach. METHODOLOGY: Starting from the analysis of the State-of-the-Art and many case-studies, eight parameters of evaluation were defined, appraising their relative importance through a weighting system defined with several experts. The resulting evaluation tool establishes in what measure healthcare facilities follow the Open Building principles. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The tool is tested to ten case-studies, chosen for their flexible features, in order to determine his effectiveness and to identify projects' weaknesses and strengths. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that many Open Building's principles are already in use but, only through a good design thinking, it will be possible to guarantee architectures for health adaptable for future social challenges.

Humanisation and soft qualities in emergency rooms.

UNLABELLED: Scenario. Currently, there are few evaluation methods that analyse social aspects in healthcare issues, especially humanisation and well-being, as perceived by users in emergency departments which are places in which patients' psycho-physical well-being is decisive. For this reason, research was conducted to create a tool to improve the quality of these areas. METHODOLOGY: In order to conduct the research, the work was structured in three phases: the first, based on the analysis of State-of-the-Art and the current studies on the interactions established between the physical and emotional conditions of the structure and the users; the second, through the definition of a questionnaire which explores humanisation and comfort aspects; the third, through the application of the instrument. RESULTS: The paper presents and analyses data collected from the application on a case study in Milan, analysing the responses and proposing design suggestions for increasing the quality of emergency environments. CONCLUSIONS: In anticipation of future works, the application of such a tool can provide the opportunity to improve and enhance quality and staff efficiency in emergency department spaces.

Social sustainability in healthcare facilities: a rating tool for analysing and improving social aspects in environments of care.

INTRODUCTION: Nowadays several rating systems exist for the evaluation of the sustainability of buildings, but often their focus is limited to environmental and efficiency aspects. Hospitals are complex constructions in which many variables affect hospital processes. Therefore, a research group has developed a tool for the evaluation of sustainability in healthcare facilities. METHODOLOGY: The paper analyses social sustainability issues through a tool which evaluates users' perception from a the quality and well-being perspective. It presents a hierarchical structure composed of a criteria and indicators system which is organised through a weighing system calculated by using the Analytic Network Process. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The output is the definition of a tool which evaluates how Humanisation, Comfort and Distribution criteria can affect the social sustainability of a building. CONCLUSION: Starting from its application, it is evident that the instrument enables the improvement of healthcare facilities through several design and organisational suggestions for achieving healing and sustainable architectures.