Insights & Solutions

Learn about: how innovative design can be achieved at the same or similar cost, how design can result in a well-regarded community landmark, and how community-based care improves patient use and compliance with regimens.

Learn about: how facility design facilitates population health goals for a community health clinic, how pod-based layout promotes staff interaction, collaboration, and efficiency, and how the ‘group visit’ room supports patient engagement, education, and continuity of care.

Learn about: how talking rooms can complement consultation-based care, how workstation design can help balance a team-based care approach and staff retention efforts, and how design can maximize the accessibility to transportation and community amenities.

Built environment strategies can help healthcare organizations and communities promote healthy living, reduce obesity, and prevent chronic disease. Given the increasing focus on community health and preventive medicine, it is important that healthcare organizations and the communities they serve incorporate built environment strategies that result in healthy behavior.

With support from the Kresge Foundation, The Center for Health Design has developed a standardized Community Health Center Facility Evaluation tool that supports design for population health. The tool is intended to support both design and post-occupancy evaluation of built projects with respect to population health goals.

You know the old saying “It takes a village to raise a child”? For Florida Hospital in Orlando, it also takes a village to promote a healthier way of living.

“So, what is population health, anyway?” is a question I hear often—and the answers that follow really run the gamut. There is already a wide range of interpretations of what population health really means, and how it plays out in the real world.

What’s your design inspiration? Lately, I’ve heard several healthcare designers say that they’re focused on the concept of “population health” and the opportunity it offers to create meaningful change. While designing for the health of a community is not a novel idea, taking a broader perspective to move healthcare design strategies beyond the hospital setting and into the community has been exploding in popularity over the last few years.

Creating Supportive Environments 

My Safety Net Clinic (MySNC) was developed by Dr. Larry Mallak and Wasif Butt of Western Michigan University in 2011. MySNC was funded by a grant from the California HealthCare Foundation, in conjunction with The Center for Health Design.