Healthcare short course focuses on how design can support staff needs

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The one-day course is timely as it comes on the heels of a Health Education England report that identified the need to safeguard the mental and physical wellbeing of NHS staff. Among the report’s recommendations are fast-tracked mental health referrals for NHS staff and rest spaces for those on call. Health and social care secretary Matt Hancock has backed the recommendations, recognising that “NHS staff must be our utmost priority.”

The BREI course will explore whether healthcare facilities are designed and equipped for staff needs and what key spatial issues need to be considered to provide an optimum working environment. 

“These are questions that have not been phrased yet in the health sector but solutions will be required rapidly,” said MSc Healthcare Facilities programme director Dr Evangelia Chrysikou.

The course will include sessions on: Burn-Out, Stress, and Professional Grief: Designing better healthcare spaces for dealing with death and dying, presented by Sergio Silverio, honorary research fellow, EGA Institute for Women's Health, UCL; Wellbeing in health staff: multiple factors, multiple solutions, presented by Dr Danielle Lamb, programme manager AD-CARE, Division of Psychiatry, UCL; Retaining Staff in Healthcare Organisations, by Susan Elsworth, HR & training manager, Staff2000; and Patient-centred care or Staff-enabled care? Demystifying a False Dichotomy in Hospital Design, presented by Dr. Isaiah Durosaiye, research associate, School of Architecture, the University of Sheffield.

BREI’s first healthcare short course, held in December 2018, focused on immersive technologies for healthcare. Areas covered included reimagining human building interaction and how gaming technologies could disrupt the design of hospitals and infrastructure for users and staff.

Participant Reece Philliskirk, healthcare planner at Essentia Trading Ltd, said the course illustrated how immersive technologies had strong implications for the future design of hospital buildings and the ways to improve patient care and involvement in their treatment. 

“I felt it elaborated and provided insight into design decisions that are up and coming, but need more exposure to inspire confidence in their viability,” he said.

For more information or to book your place on Understanding the Needs and Options for Healthcare Facilities to Support Staff on 11 April 2019, click here.

Image: Luis Melendez for Unsplash