About

We are a visual learning company that supports business innovation, strategic planning, and collaborative design—
both onsite and online.

learn more
| contact us

Learn to Scribe. Change the World.

Search

Vimeo Twitter LinkedIn Flickr  Blog RSS Blogger
Sign up! Become a part of our community of friends.

Social Media
Powered by Squarespace
Subscribe
Archive
« April Fool! The Purpose of Pranks | Main | Red Army Choir Does Lynyrd Skynyrd »
Sunday
Mar302008

The Art of Healing

How better aesthetics in hospitals can make for happier—and healthier—patients by Virginia Postrel
clipped from www.theatlantic.com

But why assume good medicine must come with bad design? Most hotel guests care more about reliable reservations than about crisp duvet covers. That doesn’t mean they want ugly rooms, though. Given the choice, they’ll go for the hotel that offers the best of both. When Starwood Hotels, which owns the Westin, Sheraton, and W brands, upgraded its rooms in the late 1990s, the rest of the hotel industry followed.

Under similar competitive pressure, medical facilities react the same way. When Baby Boomer women started choosing hotel-like birthing centers over hospital delivery rooms, hospitals quickly wised up. Now even rural hospitals offer well-designed labor-delivery-recovery suites. “People do shop, and they will actually sometimes change an obstetrician because they want a certain hospital experience,” says Malkin.

Much of the time, however, patients don’t know they can do better.

hospital decor

PrintView Printer Friendly Version

EmailEmail Article to Friend

Reader Comments

There are no comments for this journal entry. To create a new comment, use the form below.

PostPost a New Comment

Enter your information below to add a new comment.

My response is on my own website »
Author Email (optional):
Author URL (optional):
Post:
 
Some HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>