Healthcare Design - August 2015 - 52

Supportive services
There's a lot of programming that has to be planned
outside the patient rooms that supports the overall
birth experience as well as the health of both mom
and baby. For the units themselves, designers agree
that although a trend in acute care, decentralized
nursing isn't as critical in maternity spaces because
patients aren't generally at risk. "The patient can still
use the nurse call system, which is tied directly to
their caregiver, and typically there's a family member
or friend with them," Linney-Isaacson says. However,
due to the square footage being added to patient
rooms, most often making them wider as opposed to
longer, the travel distances for nurses along corridors
is growing, a fact that Sakalouski says could push a
decentralized approach into favor.
Technology has also progressed to allow staff to
provide patients more privacy if preferred, with mobile
monitoring keeping caregivers up to speed. "They
don't necessarily need to have visual oversight to
know what's going on and how the labor is progressing, and then there's also a push to have the nurses
interact with the patients and be in the room with
them," Sakalouski says.
However, for more critical care spaces, such
as NICUs, WakeMed uses a touchdown station
between every two rooms with clear doors on its allprivate rooms. While NICU projects in recent years
often use a private room model, some opt for a mix
of private rooms and an open pod or simply an open
pod-a decision often made based on square footage, nursing ratios, and levels of acuity being seen.
As for design, Sakalouski says size once again has
become a factor, with NICU areas being expanded
for more family as well as to house more equipment.
"It's amazing what these doctors and nurses can do,
and that requires more technology, but they're able
to save these babies," she says. "All of this equipment has its own clearances and comes with staff,
too." At Park Nicollet, a private room model was
used with large sliding doors that provide enough
clearance for mothers to be wheeled into the rooms
in their beds to visit babies right after birth, with a
residential nursery aesthetic used to help diminish
the scary nature of the space.
Adjacencies are key, too, with C-section rooms
generally sited close to LDR rooms and antepartum
rooms, and infant resuscitation rooms in proximity to
the C-section space.
Family waiting areas are often carefully orchestrated,
as well, sited near postpartum rooms instead of LDR
52 HCDmagazine.com 08.15

spaces to keep waiting grandparents and others largely
out of sight from patients wishing to walk the halls
uninterrupted during labor. "The labor space is pretty
sacred, and the way we flow visitors keeps it that way,"
says Todd of Park Nicollet's design. Another trick is to
break the family waiting areas into small nooks where a
patient's visitors can huddle together rather than feel like
they're in a large holding station. That space can then
also be accessed easily when visitors need to step out
of postpartum rooms during patient exams.
Planning for births that don't end with celebration
is another critical element to the overall design, with
experts recommending the inclusion of a private waiting
area or "quiet room" for families to mourn a loss. At Park
Nicollet, a fetal demise space was created away from
the postpartum noise that includes an anteroom for
family as well as a curtained exam area for the infant
that allows testing to be done without going far from

Top: An LDR room at The
Mother Baby Center at Abbott
Northwestern Hospital in
Minneapolis, designed by
HDR and opened in February
2013, features "super
graphics" integrated within
the architecture (as seen on
the headwall) for a modern
approach to providing nature
views. Above: Patient rooms
in Woman's Hospital in Baton
Rouge, La., opened in August
2012 and designed by HKS
Inc., are generous in size.
Careful attention was given to
views into the room and from
the patient bed to the exterior
landscape.

COURTESY OF HDR, © 2013 BALLOGGPHOTO.COM (MOTHER BABY); HKS INC./BLAKE MARVIN (WOMAN'S HOSPITAL)

to be able to keep it classic. You have to avoid trendy
colors, using artwork and lighting more to create the
effect you want."
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Healthcare Design - August 2015

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