According to architect, Ana Maria Silva Mejia, ‘a new era for the design of hospitals in Guatemala has arrived’, with a considerable growth in interest around good healthcare facility design.
Here, in a slightly adapted version of an article, ‘A new methodology for design’, first published in the IFHE (International Federation of Hospital Engineering) Digest 2012, she reports on the application of a new methodology designed to optimise efficient use of space, and clinical and other adjacencies, in a district hospital in the City of Zacapa. The system has subsequently been successfully applied to a number of other Guatemalan healthcare facilities.
With the help of the Italian Government, we have established a new methodology which can be applied directly to the needs of Guatemala, to make changes to the existing health structure, and to the proposed design of new hospitals. This methodology is being used in applications such as the Regional Hospital of Zacapa, which is classified as a thirdlevel healthcare unit. It has 220 beds, treating different branches of medicine, including general medicine, paediatrics, trauma, surgery, and obstetrics, and is designed to meet the needs of more than 40,000 people. The process used in the new methodology needs to take into consideration several factors, including territorial local issues; demographic aspects of health; the health organisation; networks of health services; the SWOT (Strengths, Opportunities, Weaknesses, and Threats) analysis of the existing hospital structure or design; the functional diagram, and the project guide.
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