Conference - Both Days

Monday

Today I spent most of the day the at the conference. There was not much time to do anything else. It started at 8am with an education session. I attended: Biophilic Healthcare Design with Roger Ulrich. For many years I have used his research to back up some EBD and I mostly just wanted to hear him talk. But it was actually amazingly interesting and I think that I will now go back to BLP and share this concept’s potential. Most of the stuff we do has this embedded within it anyway.

The next session was Smart Pods and was a presented by Rob Thompson from Royal College of Art in England. What an amazing guy! In short these guys have been studying ambulances and the possibility of reducing the amount carried in an ambulance to attend to minor incidents, reducing the amount of admissions through hospitals. The majority of the presentation was on the design process and it was great to listen to creative principles and their application during the process.

I attended a round table discussion next about Mock Up Room and where and why they should be used. Was really interested in how people were assessing the outcomes of the rooms and how they were applying them to the project, which stages, how to get sign offs etc. There were some great ideas, ones that I will be taking away and developing.

After lunch — where I met some people from Melbourne — I attended another session on Agent Based Simulation — which at this point was a little bit of overload for me. I watched the screen and how little people were moving all over it, and I understand the concept, but I assume that if I need to simulate model I will be learning it once plugging it into the program. This session was not too helpful.

The last one for the afternoon was The Scandinavian Example — 4 Different Projects and Patient Focus. It was more that words can describe. The Scandinavians just have a way of adding design to a functional space and keeping the design at the foreground. Some of these projects were bid stages, so practical application had not been tested, but Trondheim was discussed and as far as I know it seems to be getting good reviews.

Monday Networking Function - At night we had a networking function at Universal Walk — which is just outside Universal Studios. Again a complete amount of overload with lights and big buildings and everything just maxed out. I thought that I was in Universal Studios and can’t imagine that there was more! We had Latin for dinner (my first Paella), and met a wonderful couple from New Orleans who came with us on a little boat trip and filled our night with laughter and chatter. Chris and I returned to Gaylord Palms and had a coffee then went back to out hotel.

Tuesday

Today I was truly challenged! It was another day full of education sessions. Started with: The Role of Sustainability in Creating Healing environments. Basically outlined the potentials and then gave 8 case studies for hospitals that were reducing and getting to their sustainable goals. This was really good and assuring to see. There are things that I can use here to help our office even. Was surprised at how much composting was being introduced. There was also a focus on including the Facility Operators from the hospitals as much as the Nurses and Doctors.

The next session was the challenging one — for some reason I ditched the one I was planning to go to and got into this one: Greening Healthcare Buildings: A Greenpeace Co-Founders Perspective. Well, this guy Dr. Patrick Moore shocked me and has really given me some research to do. Pro-nuclear, pro-pvc … chemicals and science to help us. Use GE for benefit. There were some real things that he showed and examples that spoke to me, and I there is certainly some stuff that I have been fed from other sources that may be sided. I think that I need to just read and search for some of my own findings to establish an opinion and direction on this. Will have to do some more work here.

Tuesday Lunch - Was asked to have lunch with a Nursing Association here in the US (NIHD), which was good and I think that the connections here will be very fruitful. Met us with some more great and interesting people.

Then went to another round table, When Theory Doesn’t meet Practice — Ten Healthcare Design Innovations that Affected Patient Recovery. I was going in here hoping to get 10 innovations to apply — instead came out with 10 that had affected patient recovery — like the lobotomy (which I didn’t know won a Nobel Prize????). So it wasn’t too productive, but just shadowed my concern of: What is innovation? Who determines it? As most people say today “this is innovative”, what does that mean? Still have to work on this as well. I am not sure where to go on this one.

Tuesday Dinner - We had dinner at Gaylord Palms Island Resort — as some people had been stuck inside the one place for the whole 4 days. One of the people we had coffee with after was saying — let me off this island! It was a great dinner (the last for the 3 of us together!) and afterwards we met up with some people from Melbourne and we ended up chatting for quite a bit of the night.

So as for the two days, packed with information, now I need to get it out and into a presentation for work. I am actually looking forward to presenting and letting people know that this information is out there and available to access.