Healing Spaces: A Multi-Sensory Patient-Centred Approach to Hospital Design

QUT Design Lab

Join us for a transformative exploration of hospital environments, and the importance of considering noise, light, and the senses.

QUT Kelvin Grove Campus, Z9-607

<p>Visiting from the University of Bristol, A/Prof Victoria Bates will reflect on the history of hospital sensory experiences in the NHS, while QUT’s A/Prof Veronica Garcia-Hansen will focus on the role of lighting and Amanda Fox (Associate Professor of Nursing at QUT and Redcliffe Hospital) will discuss sensory blankets in dementia. Oystein (Stein) Tronstead from The Prince Charles Hospital will share findings from the ‘ICU of the future’ project, and the importance of patient-centred design to ensure patients thrive, not just survive.</p>

Agenda

Welcome from host Professor Evonne Miller, QUT Design Lab Centre Director

Topic: How the noises of a hospital can become a healing soundscape. Victoria is Associate Professor in Modern Medical History at the University of Bristol. She was awarded a UK Research and Innovation Future Leaders Fellowship (202-2027) for the project Sensing Spaces of Healthcare: Rethinking the NHS Hospital, which asks how people have experienced hospitals through time, and the legacy of their perceptions in current hospital design. It will create the first sensory history of hospitals. Harnessing participatory practices, her research is creating a novel multidisciplinary methodology for eliciting memories and sensations of hospitals, which will encourage new ways of thinking and practices among researchers, architects, and designers. Her recent book is Making Noise in the Modern Hospital (2021).

Speaker 1:  Associate Professor Victoria Bates, University of Bristol. 

Topic: Creating healing environments in hospitals through efficient lighting design. Veronica is an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture and Built Environment, with a background in architecture design and building science. Her principal area of research focuses on the interplay between building design and performance, visual and thermal comfort and human health and wellbeing. A 2020 WiSTEM2D (Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, Manufacturing, and Design) Johnson & Johnson Scholar, she will share findings from this project exploring how to create healing environments in hospitals through efficient lighting design.

Speaker 2: Associate Professor Veronica Garcia-Hansen, QUT  

Topic: ICU of the future project – Patient-centred design to ensure patients thrive, not just survive. Stein is a Physiotherapy Researcher and manager of The Prince Charles Hospital’s Critical Care Research Group, with extensive critical care clinical and research experience. He continues to manage several clinical projects, including the ‘ICU of the Future’ project, a collaborative, multi-disciplinary, and intersectoral project, putting patients at the centre of ICU design. Led by The Prince Charles Hospital’s Critical Care Research Group, the project aims to fundamentally redesign the ICU environment to not only achieve survival, but provide a superior recovery experience, optimised outcomes of care and quality of life, incorporating the patient’s needs and wishes into an improved ICU design. Using advanced technology and evidence-based design, the new bedspaces tailor the care environment to patient’s shifting clinical needs and personal preferences.

Speaker 3: 	Oystein Tronstead, The Prince Charles Hospital 

Topic: Using deep touch pressure via weighted blankets to support patients with dementia. Amanda has over 18 years' experience as a registered nurse, and holds a joint Associate Professor of Nursing at QUT and Redcliffe Hospital. Amanda was an NHMRC Capacity Building in Dementia Care Research Fellow (2019-21), and has a program of research that optimises care for people experiencing dementia and delirium. She leads multidisciplinary teams to implement evidence-based practice, improve health outcomes, and reduce distress for patients and their care partners. Therapeutic weighted blankets provide deep touch pressure and mimic the sensation of a hug. Research suggests that deep touch pressure can induce a state of calmness by engaging the parasympathetic nervous system. Weighted blankets have the potential to reduce agitation for people with dementia - reducing use of pharmaceuticals and in-hospital complications.

Speaker 4: Associate Professor Amanda Fox, QUT Nursing and Redcliffe Hospital

Panel discussion facilitated by A/Prof Jen Seevinck, Associate Professor (Interactive and Visual Design), QUT.