Making a difference to the patient experience

a “one-size-fits-all” hospital gown claimed to provide a more comfortable fit than existing designs; and a reclining day chair designed to enhance patient comfort and safety, were among a raft of new hospital items developed in lightning-fast time by multidisciplinary teams, and shown in prototype in London recently, as part of a Department of Health/Design Council project to improve patient privacy and dignity. Jonathan Baillie reports.

The various designs, many of which were dubbed “ground-breaking” by the Department of Health, were shown to a sizeable audience by the manufacturer/designer and, in some cases, architect/manufacturer/designer teams, that developed them, at a special launch event at London’s Design Council on 22 March; it is hoped some could be in UK hospitals by early next year. All were conceived and developed by multidisciplinary, multiskilled teams that won a competition launched last year which, under the Department of Health and Design Council’s joint “Design for Patient Dignity” initiative, challenged designers, manufacturers, and others with the necessary skills and expertise, to come up with products that would help address key patient concerns over such issues as sharing wards and washing/toilet facilities with the opposite sex, and being unable to hold private bedside conversations without being overheard. Launched by the Department of Health last October, the Design for Patient Dignity programme follows the success of an earlier Department of Health/Design Council-led initiative, “Design Bugs Out” (HEJ – June 2009), which saw design consultancies and manufacturers of a wide range of hospital equipment collaborate to create and prototype furniture, bedding items, and other hospital components, fixtures, and fittings, designed to minimise infection risk, for instance by being easier to clean, and incorporating smooth surfaces and fewer “nooks and crannies” for bacteria to thrive within. A number have since gone on to full-scale production. The latest items to be produced (the designer/manufacturer teams, who were selected from a very substantial pool of entrants, had only eight weeks to develop prototypes from scratch) include a “Universal Patient Gown”, a “Reclining Day Chair”, “Bay Screen”, and poncho, (all “submitted by one team); a “Retractable Screen” which folds back, “concertina-style”, against the ward wall; a further “Lightweight Screen”, and “Curtain Lock”, a “Capsule Washroom”; a “Smart Mirror”; a “Washroom Pod”; and a “Modular Bed Pod”. In addition, designers from the Helen Hamlyn Centre at the Royal College of Art showcased items including a disposable paper table mat that could incorporate ward information and be personalised with patient-specific data, for instance providing the names of the key nursing staff, or perhaps details of mealtimes and visiting hours. The table mat was designed under the category “Improving patient information”. The various designs developed by Helen Hamlyn designers as part of this programme also include a new signage system that uses colours and icons to help patients find their way to the various hospital facilities. The signs can be “flipped over”, and locked into place, to enable hospital staff to quickly “reassign”, say, bathrooms, toilets, or rooms, for different sexes.

Wide-ranging audience