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Home / News & Insights / Inpatient Mental Health Design Strategies Post-COVID-19
“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” -- Benjamin Franklin
COVID-19 will create an expanded need for mental health services in the United States as individuals deal with isolation, economic uncertainty, and worse – the loss of loved ones. COVID-19 has also taught us hospitals and inpatient and outpatient medical care centers should be designed and constructed to adapt in responding to surge events, mass casualty incidents (MCI), or “what-if” scenarios. However, inpatient mental health facilities should be planned and designed in a manner to mitigate and respond to these events too. The National Institute of Building Sciences’ Natural Hazard Mitigation Saves Report indicates, “Every $1 spent on mitigation saves $6 on future disaster losses.” While developing your next inpatient healthcare facility with your architecture and design team, consider the following planning and design strategies.
The safety of patients, medical providers, and care team members along with clinical accuracy should always be the primary goal when planning and designing a facility. The life safety of patients and caregivers should establish the foundation on which all other design objectives and priorities rest.
The planning and design of the medical providers’ and care team members’ spaces most often affect workflow, processes, and policies. In the same manner as reviewing your emergency response planning with your A&D team, be sure to review your processes and policies so the medical team’s workspaces may be designed to promote them.
Do not neglect to consider everyone’s preference for comfort and how that can shape their experience and satisfaction, whether a patient or a medical care team member.
While the focus on the physical effects of COVID-19 is vital, it’s also important to remember to toll of the virus on the mental health of both patients and healthcare staff. Specifically, when planning your new inpatient facility, collaborate with your architecture and design team to incorporate design strategies that will help improve the mental wellbeing of your staff and patients. Taking the time and care to incorporate these features will increase the safety of patients and healthcare providers as well as address their mental health issues.
Haskell delivers $2+ billion annually in Architecture, Engineering, Construction (AEC) and Consulting solutions to assure certainty of outcome for complex capital projects worldwide. Haskell is a global, fully integrated, single-source design-build and EPC firm with over 2,600 highly specialized, in-house design, construction and administrative professionals across industrial and commercial markets. With 25+ office locations around the globe, Haskell is a trusted partner for global and emerging clients.
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