NFPA Journal - January/February 2018 - 61

As part of its effort to create a "hospital of the future," BMC has incorporated patient-oriented elements, including a "healing garden."

A simple prefabricated valance was
found, and was installed and evaluated in the mockup. The team quickly
realized that the prefabricated valence
would work out much better from
a maintenance and cost standpoint
while achieving the same aesthetic
as the custom-built component. This
single change represented a savings
of between $80,000 and $90,000 in
up-front costs, with additional savings
over time in maintenance costs.

MEASURE POST-OCCUPANCY
PERFORMANCE RESULTS

Patients and families sometimes felt
isolated in the Phase 1 West Wing
because they reported that it was too
quiet. They also reported that they
were unable to find staff at the nurses'
stations; while the number of nurses'
stations had been increased, meaning
a reduction in the number of steps for
the care teams, it also meant fewer
staff at each station, resulting in both
the nursing staff and patients feeling
more isolated. The interdisciplinary
project team used all of this data to
improve the design of the Phase 4
South Wing. Instead of the seven small
nurse stations that had been included
in Phase 1, the new design called for
four slightly larger stations.

In the final step, the team implements
the research study as outlined in the
plan to determine if the design is performing as intended. This critical step
can help inform future designs, but it
is often the most underutilized step
in the process, since it can be difficult
and time-consuming to conduct postoccupancy research once the facility
becomes operational.
Using post-occupancy data, the
BMC team learned that patients
want quiet-but not too much quiet.

With the help of the evidence-based
design process, the Baystate Phase 4
South Wing project was completed
three months ahead of schedule and
with more than a million dollars in
cost savings.
Unfortunately, Baystate is an
impressive but uncommon success
story, as EBD remains an underutilized, underappreciated tool for health
care stakeholders to get the most out

ROBERT BENSON

Going forward

of the design and construction process.
Building the hospital of the future
in multiple phases allows the team
to take time between phases to learn
from previous designs and operational
models.
I've worked on a number of health
care projects in recent years where
evidence-based design was utilized
and informed the design, enhancing
the operational model and allowing
for flexibility and growth in the facility. Those are the kinds of lessons
learned that can and should be applied
to other projects. This kind of project
management innovation is urgently
needed in this time of increasing
health care regulatory pressure and
decreasing budgets.
Baystate has taken the lessons to
heart. A third new patient wing is
slated to begin construction sometime
in the next 3-5 years, and the team,
including Baystate and its design and
construction partners, plans to implement the same evidence-based design
process to continue to improve the
BMC campus.
KIRSTEN WALTZ is president of U.S. operations for
Steffian Bradley Architects. LYNN KENNEY, director
of industry relations for the Center for Health Design,
contributed to this article.

N F PA . O R G / J O U R N A L * NFPA JOURNAL

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - January/February 2018