Healthcare Design - August 2013 - 24

C THE CENTER | 08.13
Global shifts, large and small
What China and the U.S. can learn from one another when it comes to
planning our healthcare facilities
By Debra Levin
In May, I had the opportunity to speak at the 14th China
Hospital Construction Forum, held during the Hospital
Build & Infrastructure China Exhibition & Congress in
Nanjing, just a few hours outside of Shanghai. While
there, I also met the next generation of healthcare
architects at Southeast University, visited an architectural firm with 3,000 employees, toured a newer
traditional Chinese hospital, and ate a lot of noodles.

it brought home how much progress we've made
here. Two-and-a-half decades ago, we struggled with
many of the same issues that the Chinese are facing
today. Single patient rooms were not the industry
standard, the availability of healthcare furniture and
products was a fraction of what it is now, there was
no easily accessible formal body of research, no
community of support, and the idea of patient-cen-

My first impression was amazement at how much
had changed since I'd last visited in 2010. Although
the United States was deep in a recession at the
time, China was in the midst of a building boom.
During that first trip, I spent three weeks traveling
the country and noticed every major city I visited
had signs of new construction. Fast forward to 2013,
and the building in China continues to boom but
has now extended from the major cities outward
for many miles. In terms of healthcare, in 2012, the
Chinese government developed a five-year plan to
build 20,000 hospitals and healthcare facilities. I was
told that there are 3,000 hospital projects currently
in progress, one of which is planned to have 10,000
beds. Either number is significant, especially as we
see so many of our hospitals here in America either
merging or closing their doors.
There's a deep desire in China to have access
to resources and to absorb knowledge swiftly. The
Chinese know they have a significant opportunity to
affect generations to come with the projects they're
currently building. The challenge is that there's little
time to problem solve and innovate, given how
quickly these projects are being constructed. How
do you maximize innovation as the walls are being
built around you?
In the 24 years that I've been at The Center for
Health Design, the progress in every aspect of our
industry here in the U.S. has been dramatic yet developed over time with much trial and error. Because
of the pent-up demand in China and the migration
of its citizens from rural to urban settings, the speed
of design and construction of medical structures is
happening at breakneck speeds. It's obvious that the
time needed to progress through their own learning
curve is a luxury that the Chinese don't have. Within
the decade, the next generation of healthcare architecture in China will be complete.
The tour I had of a three-year-old traditional
Chinese hospital was enlightening. In many ways,

tered anything was discussed by few. However, some
progress in China has been made. There are many
research-supported design interventions relating to
sound and natural light. In the hospital I visited, all patient spaces faced east to take advantage of natural
morning light. All the patient rooms had open ventilation for fresh air, and families played a significant part
in the patient's care.
Nonetheless, it was still jarring to see three patients to a room, having fought so long here in the
U.S. for single-patient rooms to reduce the chance
of medical errors and the spread of infection from
patient to patient. But looking at the pressures facing
our healthcare system and the move towards more
distributed care here in the U.S., it also forced me
to think about the long-term financial viability of our
healthcare system. We face so many challenges, and
change is inevitable.
Knowing this, what lessons on economy-of-scale
can we learn from China that may answer some of
our own complex questions? Though our cultures are
very different, both our countries are facing similar

www.healthcaredesignmagazine.com 08.13

challenges when it comes to an aging population:
parents who no longer live near their offspring, diminishing resources, and an understaffed workforce.
Solutions are needed that will address these challenges and help us to create a clear vision of what an
appropriate healthcare continuum looks like. Looking
at healthcare through a global lens gives us a much
larger set of potential solutions. Site visits around the
world are costly, but publications like this one and
events like the Healthcare Design Conference, where
attendees come from around the world, are perfect
ways to broaden horizons, as we work to develop a
healthcare system that will provide quality care to our
citizens for decades to come. HCD
Debra Levin, EDAC, is president and CEO of The Center for Health Design. She can be reached at dlevin@
healthdesign.org.

Debra Levin

http://www.healthcaredesignmagazine.com

Healthcare Design - August 2013

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