The healing environment
Zest: Improving the healthcare environment, is working to improve healthcare for patients and staff working conditions across Plymouth. We are based in the Planning Department of Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust.
Zest works with project teams on the design of new and refurbished healthcare buildings and is also active in promoting and developing a wide range of projects to help improve both the patient experience and staff working lives.
Zest is committed to working in partnership with organisations across the business, education and health fields. Why do we need to improve the healthcare environment? We all know that good environments make us feel better, and feeling better is the key to getting better. Increasingly more and more users of the NHS understand the impact of the healthcare environment on the patient experience.
There is substantial evidence that good environments can have a positive therapeutic effect on patients. We all perceive our environment through our five senses: sight, smell, touch, taste and hearing. This sensory information is relayed to the brain and affects our physiological, emotional, psychological and, ultimately, physical well being. An understanding of the sensory impact our surroundings have on all of us contributes to the creation of a well designed healthcare environment.
As well as the impact of the senses on design studies clearly show that a whole range of environmental factors - including lighting, colour, aroma, views, art, scale, proportion, sound, texture and materials - also have a powerful effect on patients. Understanding these factors is the key to good design - it allows designers to work with greater skill creating truly positive healthcare environments.
Good healthcare environments lead to:
- faster patient recoveries
- reduced pain
- fewer cases of infection
- greater patient satisfaction
- reduced stress levels among staff
- easier recruitment and retention of quality staff
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| Sensory garden entrance at the Child Development Centre |
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| Music workshop children's wards Derriford Hospital |
