Healthcare Environment Awards
The Healthcare Environment Awards recognize how design can improve safety, enhance experiences, increase organizational efficiency and improve any number of outcomes. The Center for Health Design, in partnership with Healthcare Design magazine, has celebrated the 2021 Healthcare Environment Awards recipients at the Healthcare Design Conference & Expo in Cleveland, Ohio.
Acute Care Winner:
William P. Clements Jr. University Hospital, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Hoefer Welker | CallisonRTKL
Alternative Settings Winner:
Boston Children's at Two Brookline Place, Isgenuity & Steffian Bradley Architects
Ambulatory Care Winner:
Rainier Beach Clinic, Northwest Kidney Centers, Mahlum Architects
Conceptual Design Winner:
Toward a Model of Safety and Care for Trauma Room Design, Research Group, Sara Bayramzadeh, Principal Investigator, Kent State University
Student Work Winner:
Level 1 Trauma Room for 2021, Md Mazharul Islam | Sara Bayramzadeh, Kent State University
Acute Care Honorable Mention:
Marcus Tower at Piedmont Atlanta Hospital, HKS, Inc.
Ambulatory Care Honorable Mention:
TriHealth, Harold M. And Eugenia S. Thomas Comprehensive Care Center, GBBN
Student Work Honorable Mention:
Arcadia – A Continuous Care Retirement Community, Dani Kolker and Caroline Coleman, University of Kansas
The Healthcare Environment Awards are conferred each year at the Healthcare Design Expo & Conference. For more information, click here.
acute care winner
William P. Clements Jr. University Hospital, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Hoefer Welker | CallisonRTKL
The final phase of Clements University Hospital (CUH) in Dallas, Texas opened in January 2021. It has significantly expanded UT Southwestern Medical Center’s clinical, teaching and research capabilities and concludes a 10-year, multi-phased building program consisting of 2 million square feet, 750 beds, a materials management facility, central utility plant, four parking garages, and an elevated connector linking campus facilities. Its foundational premise was that the hospital should be considered a care team member, and every aspect should be designed to enhance the patient’s care and experience.
Over 600 participants within 14 committees were engaged in the design process. Committees authored white papers that were peer reviewed and in conjunction with the architectural design team established guiding principles, program, scope, schedule, and budget. The bed unit shown above was designed to accommodate ever-changing patient profiles, and performed well during the Covid pandemic allowing effective and safe expansion, contraction, and isolation.
ALTERNATIVE SETTINGS WINNER
Boston Children's at Two Brookline Place, Isgenuity & Steffian Bradley Architects
Uplifting, whimsical, and designed with neurodiversity in mind, Boston Children’s at Two Brookline Place is home to the newly created Brain, Mind, and Behavior Center: providing world-class collaborative care and translational research for those with neurodevelopmental or neuropsychiatric conditions. To serve this unique population, the project choreographs a uniquely engaging yet calm, comfortable, and safe experience. The facility’s wayfinding, graphics, and design theme “The Amazing You” celebrates the capacity of our brains to wonder, discover, explore, and imagine, surpassing limitations of the body. Instagrammable moments permeate the project, offering moments of levity that elevate the patient experience from stressful to whimsical.
The design responds directly to research about the autism spectrum. Walls and ceilings were activated to encourage eyes to stay up and engaged while a network of quiet and safe spaces were carved out for when overstimulation proves challenging. Diagnostic boards were covered to limit temptation of dangly cords. Floor to ceiling windows were tinted with Family Advisory Council-approved frosting to limit fears of heights and reduce anxieties over patterning. All of these are examples of how an outpatient experience can be as considered and unique as those who visit.
AMBULATORY CARE WINNER
Rainier Beach Clinic, Northwest Kidney Centers, Mahlum Architects
Seeking to revolutionize dialysis care with a patient-centric alternative, Northwest Kidney Centers sited its first free-standing clinic within the Rainier Beach neighborhood and invited the design team to explore a new model for dialysis care.
Patient surveys, existing clinic observations and a thorough literature review informed the hypothesis that direct views to nature in the clinical environment would result in a decrease in staff absenteeism and an increase in patient participation with treatment regimens. This evidence-based approach resulted in an unprecedented layout that provides equitable views to garden courtyards for all patients, while maintaining strict requirements for patient care team ratios and critical sight lines. It incorporates biophilic design strategies throughout to create an immersive and restorative environment. Keeping nature at the core of the design also resulted in a reduced environmental footprint, realizing significant reductions in water usage, operational carbon, and embodied carbon while actively restoring local ecosystems.
CONCEPTUAL DESIGN WINNER
Toward a Model of Safety and Care for Trauma Room Design, Research Group, Sara Bayramzadeh, Principal Investigator, Kent State University
The trauma room project is part of the larger research project, entitled “Toward a Model of Safety and Care for Trauma Room Design.” This project focused on four key strategic goals: staff workflow, disruptions and interruptions, technology integrations, and sensory stimuli. The goal of this conceptual design project was to develop design variations with innovative solutions to address issues related to the above key strategic goals.
Throughout the project, five milestones were accomplished: design thinking, design assignment, two reviews with end-users, and final presentation. The design demonstrates rethinking of functionality of the space and the structure of chassis to allow for consolidation or transformation of functions. They support staff performance and ultimately protect patient safety.
STUDENT WORK WINNER
Level 1 Trauma Room for 2021, Md Mazharul Islam | Sara Bayramzadeh, Kent State University
This project focused on designing a level I trauma room employing clinician-centered design interventions and technological advancements to minimize the occurrence of disruptions and interruptions and improve the workflow. Clinicians currently serving in a level I trauma room participated in interviews, focus group sessions, and design thinking sessions throughout the project – from research phase to the design phase – which informed the conceived design interventions. Findings from literature reviews were also identified during the primary qualitative data gathering processes to help define the design goals. An existing level I trauma room in a healthcare facility served as the project site.
The strategic goal was to reinforce the workflow and minimize the potential sources of disruptions and interruptions. The major tactical goals were to provide separate entrances for patients and staff, providing equal access to supplies on both sides, sufficient information display, and allocate the non-involved people inside the trauma room without affecting the resuscitation process.
ACUTE CARE HONORABLE MENTION
Marcus Tower at Piedmont Atlanta Hospital, HKS, Inc.
The location of Marcus Tower responds to three unique contexts: the existing hospital, a historic residential neighborhood and the commercial edge on Atlanta’s main corridor, Peachtree Street. Accommodating its connection to the existing hospital, the architecture makes a signature statement and embraces internal spaces that are fashioned to echo the concept of Southern hospitality, thus creating one cohesive and comfortable experience that is uniquely Piedmont.
After a year of study and master planning, Piedmont Atlanta Hospital reached the decision to: modernize their existing campus; enhance patient experience while meeting increasing demand; increase capacity for their specialties; achieve operational efficiencies to keep health care costs down and improve the quality and safety of care; and, solicit appropriate community input to ensure the project is designed with the least disruption possible. Marcus Tower makes a daring statement to the role and responsibility of healthcare and well-being in a community.
AMBULATORY CARE HONORABLE MENTION
TriHealth, Harold M. And Eugenia S. Thomas Comprehensive Care Center, GBBN
Organized around an airy and light-filled central lobby, the Thomas Center brings specialists and services for heart, imaging, and cancer care together. One of the goals of the project was to empower people to self-navigate and give them a sense of control. The atrium reveals the face of each department, while custom designed and built screen walls with complimentary material and texture create an identity for each of the primary departments: the cancer and heart institutes.
The building is nested into a garden setting with earthen berms covered in thick, diverse vegetation to help ease patient anxieties as they approach the building. Its sandstone base leads pedestrians into the facility’s atrium, which slices through the center of the building allowing light and visitors to enter from both sides. The result of the project is a medical center where people feel uplifted and restored.
STUDENT WORK HONORABLE MENTION
Arcadia – A Continuous Care Retirement Community, Dani Kolker | Caroline Coleman, University of Kansas
This project aims to provide a prototype for innovative senior living and long-term care (LTC) environments post COVID-19. The unprecedented pandemic has posed greater challenges to older adults, especially those who live in congregated and dense urban environments.
This prototype will 1) address the three plagues of senior care environments: boredom, loneliness and helplessness (Thomas, 2016); and 2) design a safe and resilient environment to better prepare for future pandemics and provide support for older adults and healthcare. The project is a 160-unit vertical Continuous Care Retirement Community (CCRC) located east of the University of Chicago Medical Center in Hyde Park, Illinois. It applies biophilic design that incorporates nature and natural light throughout its memory care, skilled nursing, assisted living and intergenerational residential units, as well as its health and wellness center. It includes spaces that encourage independence and choice, aligning with proven evidence-based design principles and best practices to improve patient, staff and visitor outcomes.