Design in Mental Health Network (DIMHN) is a UK based not-for-profit, established in 2006 and is open to anyone with an interest in improving the design of mental health environments for the benefit of patients’ wellbeing and staff safety.
https://www.dimhn.org/workstream/testing-and-innovation/
Philip Ross joined the DIMHN board in 2013, working initially on the members’ scheme and then moving to the Testing and Innovation workstream in 2015. As a manufacturer specialising on doors and hardware within the mental health sector, he was frustrated with the lack of clarity and repeatability of the testing methods which made it challenging and slow for lifesaving innovations to get adopted, not to mention the significant costs of testing with every Healthcare System, sometimes for each project they worked on. Philip has a Master’s in Mechanical Engineering, and years of experience testing doors and hardware, at Safehinge Primera, where he serves in the role of Director having founded the design company in 2007.
Over the past three years, he’s worked with BRE (Building Research Establishment) in the United Kingdom to establish the testing development partnership, and with a small working group to develop the overall approach and format of the testing and accreditation output. In the summer of 2018, the board sought input from across the sector with architects, facility managers, clinicians and manufacturers on what issues need capturing by product evaluation. His focus is now on delivering the final testing guidance and establishing an accreditation scheme with BRE before the end of 2019.