Healthcare Buildings Research Articles

Theoretical Framework for Design Recruitment Strategies In The Process Of Self-Healing Of Individuals

The concept of self-healing based on characteristics of environment design of surrounding the individual ,Healing by design, one of the most important concepts corresponding to the healing environment or healing in the context of healthcare buildings, where the awareness of this concept reach on the characteristics of internal environment in general to make it more healthy, stimulating and vital, the concept of self-healing is result of analyzing the mutual and vital relationship between human and physical and natural environment in an attempt to understand the relationship and the extent of its repercussions on the physiological and psychological level of the individual. The process of healing cannot be understood by isolation from the factors that work dynamically in the life of individual ,and function of the building is not limited to housing and containment of activities and to meet functions of life, but the most important role is to improve the performance of vital act of life and make it healthy and support self-healing. Hence, the problem of research in the awareness of importance of architecture in taking the task of stimulating self-healing for the individual, and identify characteristics of design approach based on the design processes resulting from the dynamic relationship of the individual's living with the environment. The object of the study is to build a theoretical framework of design recruitment strategies in the process of self-healing of individuals Both for therapeutic environment and general internal environment, and to derive the possible values ​​of the design characteristics that achieve those strategies stemming from the mechanism of involving the individual in a conscious and clear process of support, balance and moral nutrition in relation to the environment. The basic and secondary vocabulary and possible values ​​of the conceptual framework for the strategies of design recruitment in the healing process were three basic strategies: strategy of environment potential supporting of individual, strategy of balancing the life components of the individual and experiment of space transition, and finally the nutrition strategy at the vital and poetic level of individuals. The conclusions were based on objective understanding of the quality of design that supports the process of healing, which is completely different from the concept of design in dealing with static and formal assets. The design here is characterized by the dynamic nature of healthy lifestyle design based on stimulating the process of healing at organic, sensory and moral levels for individuals.

Embodying circularity through usable relocatable modular buildings

PurposeGlobal megatrends such as urbanization and ageing of the population result in fast-paced demographic changes, which pose different types of challenges for different regions. While many rural municipalities bear the burden of under-used buildings, cities are in a hurry to develop new ones to meet new space demands. The purpose of this paper is to assess the potential of relocatable modular buildings to address these challenges, following the principles of circular economy, while at the same time offering usability.Design/methodology/approachThis multiple case study explores existing relocatable modular health-care buildings in Finland. The case buildings host hospital support functions, imaging services, a health-care centre and a care home. The primary data comprise 21 semi-structured interviews and observation during factory and site visits.FindingsBased on the findings, relocatable modular buildings have many benefits and provide a viable option for cities and municipalities struggling to meet their fluctuating space demands. Some challenges were also identified, mainly derived from the dimensional restrictions of the modules.Originality/valueThis research contributes to the emerging body of knowledge on circular economy in the built environment. More specifically, the research provides a very concrete example of circularity and details a framework for usable and relocatable modular buildings. In conclusion, relocatable modular buildings could solve the challenges posed by quickly changing demographics in different types of regions and deliver both usability and circularity.

Examining the Influence of Passive Design Approaches on NZEBs: Potential Net Zero Healthcare Buildings Implementation in Malaysia

Nowadays, net-zero energy buildings (NZEBs) concept has gained considerable attention not only between the developed countries, but also among the developing countries including Malaysia. The rapid development in Malaysia, especially in the construction of healthcare buildings needs to be given due attention since these developments lead to all sorts of environmental problems. As the number of healthcare buildings increases, the energy consumes to operate these buildings will increase. The consequences of uncontrollable energy consumption may result in the increased volume of carbon dioxide emissions as well as depletion of natural resources. Thus, NZEBs has emerged as a proactive concept to confront with these issues. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of passive design approaches on NZEBs as well as the potential of net zero healthcare buildings implementation in Malaysia based on a review of the existing literature and by utilising semi-structured interviews with 3 experienced architects. The result of this paper indicates that there are four main passive design components has strong influences on NZEBs which are building orientation, shading devices, ventilation, and thermal insulation. These practices are being actively practiced in Malaysia construction industry; thus, it shows that net zero energy healthcare buildings are potential to be designed in Malaysia. The study has gone some way towards enhancing our understanding of the significance of passive design approaches towards net zero healthcare buildings for future implementation in Malaysia context.

MIHBS: A Mobile Interface of High Bandwidth for Wireless Sensor Networks

In modern days, wireless sensor networks and smart phones have been widely used in various application domains including healthcare, environment, and intelligent building monitoring. Although the existing smart phones, such as iPhone, SAMSUNG, and Lumia, have in-built sensors of location, camera, and accelerometer, their sensing capabilities are limited. Besides, the transmission rate of ZigBee can reach 250 kbps, which is much higher than that of smart phones’ headset port. It is necessary to keep the balance between them. In this paper, we propose an enhanced Lempel-Ziv-Welch coding scheme which is introduced to help transmit data faster, called LZW-Huffmam. Further, we apply it in a self-designed mobile extension, mobile interface of high bandwidth for sensor network (MIHBS), which is a universal interface that can transfer data to and from sensors using standard headset port of high bandwidth. LZW-Huffman can help increase the bandwidth of MIHBS by 52%.

Techno-economic optimization and real-time comparison of sun tracking photovoltaic system for rural healthcare building

This paper studies the optimum sizing and techno-economic feasibility of photovoltaic systems for rural healthcare building located in a south Indian State, Tamil Nadu, which experiences tropical weather climate. In this study, fixed tilt, annual optimum tilt (AOT), and six other sun tracking installation types are analyzed using hybrid optimization of multiple energy resource (HOMER) energy to understand the power generation potential. As a first step, weekly and monthly optimum tilt angles and AOT are estimated for the study location. The selection of the optimum configuration is arrived with the lowest values of initial cost, operating cost, total net present cost, and levelized cost of energy. It has been found that AOT with fixed installation is the optimum configuration for the study location. However, the performance would vary when the system is put to operate in practical conditions. In order to understand the varying performance, a prototype model is implemented for horizontal axis sun tracking system. The performance of the prototype is analyzed as per the varying real-time weather conditions for four days typically considering the sandstorm day, cloudy day, clear day, and partially cloudy day.

Measuring hospital qualities. A preliminary investigation on Health Impact Assessment possibilities for evaluating complex buildings.

Background and aim of the work: World Health Organization states that is possible evaluating projects’ qualities via Health Impact Assessment (HIA) but there are not specific HIA tools on hospital buildings assessment. Researchers show significant relationships between built environment and health. The research purpose is investigating how existing tools for healthcare building assessment are encouraging the development of possible hospital HIA evaluation. Methods: Based on previous works, 13 assessment tools have been included and a comparison of the criteria has been conducted to understand which the most prevalent topics are. The tools have been analyzed through literature, technical manuals and official websites. The authors identified 12 thematic categories where criteria from different tools have been clustered and discussed. Results: The most prevalent criteria are related to Indoor Environmental Quality (IEQ) (20%). In the oldest tools the evaluation was mainly on technical features while in recent instruments several indicators are related to Architectural features and innovation (48%), Education (23%) and Food (11%). Conclusions: There is growing interest in tools capable of addressing healthy hospitals encouraging IEQ, physical activity and healthy food provision related to occupants’ health outcomes. This preliminary study set the basis for further development on hospital facility HIA tools. (www.actabiomedica.it)

Role of Natural Elements in Provision of Healing Environment: Sustainable Healthcare Building

In order to improve the functional layout of hospital environment and to cope with modern changes, this paper aimed at examining the current architectural conditions in a public hospitals, and clarifying the requirements of spatial planning from the architectural standpoint. Recently, the initiative by the Iranian government to reduce the energy consumption in public buildings including hospitals is seen as the notion for sustainability in the built environment. On the other hand, designing a hospital building is architecturally accepted as a complex task both functionally and psychologically. Therefore, creating a healing environment with functional physical spaces (for example daylight utilization) to achieve sustainable hospital seems relevant and in tandem with sustainability. Many previous studies suggest that adequate and appropriate exposure to natural elements and daylight can provide a positive impact on human health and well-being of patients and medical staff in a hospital environment. This paper reviewed the role of natural elements focusing on daylight utilization as one of the physical aspects in hospital design to create a healing environment, and the effects of physical aspects on patients’ outcomes were investigated. Pilot studies on several public hospitals in different cities of Iran, was carried out to investigate the design and utilization of lighting (i.e. artificial and natural light) and its relationship to other environmental factors. Keywords : architecture, environment, hospital, sustainability.

An Investigation On Current Green Design Practices Towards Net-Zero Energy Buildings (NZEBs) Application In Malaysia Healthcare Projects

These days, the topic on the sustainable building has become one of the most important concerns in the academic studies, construction industries, as well as governmental agencies. Sustainability in the building sector has raised the attention towards a new concept called net-zero energy buildings (NZEBs). With regards to the development of Malaysia’s buildings sectors, the government has realised the undesirable effects of inefficient of energy usage by demonstrating their efforts in Construction Industry Transformation Programme (CITP) 2016-2020. Commonly, healthcare buildings are among the greatest energy consumers of any institution and the extensive use of various medical equipment, mechanical ventilation of this building has caused a high level of carbon emission. Hence, by concentrating on these issues, NZEBs become an important concept to be implemented in healthcare buildings. However, the awareness of NZEBs in Malaysia is still low and the construction industry in Malaysia still unaware of NZEBs. This paper aims to investigate the current design practices of healthcare buildings in Malaysia as well as the architect’s understanding of NZEBs through preliminary investigation among architects. Literature was reviewed and pilot studies by using semi-structured interviews were conducted. The results uncover that some green practices related to the design practices in healthcare buildings has been carried out and some of these practices are similar to the NZEBs design practices even though the term of ‘NZEBs’ is not being used. It is predicted that the paper will provide a basic knowledge for future research in NZEBs for healthcare buildings, challenges of NZEBs implementation and designing NZEBs for healthcare buildings in Malaysia.Keywords: Net zero energy buildings, Healthcare building, Current green design practices, Malaysia

A Review to Innovative Ventilation Techniques Used in Historical Hospitals in Middle East and Europe

Historically, natural ventilation has been an important factor to achieve thermal comfort and reduce energy consumption in healthcare buildings. Since the recent century, there has been an increasing change and scientific advancement that led to the reliance of mechanical ventilation systems in commercial buildings and especially in hospitals and healthcare settings. However, the fully mechanical system approaches have changed gradually after global warming and the lack of energy sources. In this context, this study investigated systematically, passive ventilation techniques used in medieval near eastern hospitals ”Bimaristans” and historical hospitals in Europe. The study traced the roots of natural ventilation in a sample of historical healthcare buildings. It also investigated ventilation techniques used in historical hospitals in Middle East and Europe.
 This study is looking forward to discover the architectural design parameters’ effects of historical hospitals on ventilation, to make a better environment for patients’ health by learning from past lessons in traditional architecture, and how could we adapt these techniques in our nowadays healthcare buildings. This step will allow further research on the adaption and integration of passive techniques inherited from the past in our contemporary hospital design.

Utilisation of Copper Slag Waste and Heavy-weight Aggregates for Production of Pre-cast shielding Concrete Elements

Concrete as a versatile building material can provide physical and biological shielding against ionizing radiation. In addition to nuclear reactor covers, facilities requiring radiation protection are radiological and X-ray laboratories in hospitals or health centres. The function of radiation protection can be met by heavy-weight concrete, whose shielding properties are largely derived from the high-density aggregates. One of the possible construction methods of shielding walls in healthcare buildings is the use of pre-cast concrete blocks. For this purpose, research on a concrete having a density in the air-dry state of higher than 3200 kg/m 3 using barite, magnetite and basalt as coarse aggregate and copper slag waste (from by-product of the process of copper extraction by smelting) as fine aggregate has been performed. The copper slag waste has been used, among others, as an abradant in the surface sand-blasting process but after such usage it is considered to be a waste and as indicated by pilot research, it can be a good substitute for sand in concrete. Mechanical properties, water absorption and sorptivity of heavy-weight concrete so produced were compared with reference concrete prepared with crushed amphibolite as coarse aggregate and quartz sand as fine aggregate. The suitability of copper slag waste for making small pre-cast shielding concrete elements is confirmed. The compressive strength of heavy-weight concrete mixtures with copper slag waste was sufficient for the intended applications. The copper slag concrete had lower water absorption and sorptivity than concrete prepared with sand. An economic analysis of the costs of producing concrete with a density higher than 3200 kg/m 3 with or without copper slag waste showed that the copper slag concrete, regardless of the type of heavy-weight aggregate used, is clearly more economical than the concrete of the compositions reported in the literature containing similar coarse aggregates and sand as the fine aggregate. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.sace.22.1.20006

Opportunities for consumer-driven load shifting in commercial and industrial buildings

Abstract Commercial and industrial buildings are typically billed for both electricity consumption and peak 15-minute demand. While this rate structure does not motivate consumers to lower the grid peak demand, it does provide strong motivation for shifting load away from the site peak. However, the economic viability of site peak reduction depends greatly on typical building operations and will vary widely from one building to the next. This paper quantifies the potential that various building types have for site peak reduction using a database of 15-minute demand for buildings in Texas. The primary contribution of this paper is the identification of building types that stand to gain the most by exploiting 15-minute peak demand charges. The influence that site peak demand reduction has on the overall grid is also analyzed. This analysis of site peak reduction in buildings leads to several interesting conclusions. For example, site peak reduction is generally most difficult at industrial and healthcare buildings. On the other hand, grade schools (K-12) and hotels may reduce the site peak with relatively little effort. However, even widespread site peak reduction will only have a minimal effect on the overall grid peak. While buildings may obtain cost savings by reducing these transmission and distribution costs, utilities should consider modifying the retail rate structure in order to provide a direct motivation for consumers to reduce wholesale electricity prices.

Conceptualizing Health Promotion in Relation to Outpatient Healthcare Building Design: A Scoping Review.

This review explored different conceptualizations of health promotion in the context of, and in relation to, outpatient building design. Today's healthcare organizations are implementing holistic healthcare approaches such as health promotion, while simultaneously increasing their outpatient services. These health promotion approaches, focused on empowering people to take control of their health, are expected to have implications for the outpatient healthcare building design. Yet there is limited knowledge what these may be. A review of the literature on the current state of the art is thus needed to enable and support dialog on future healthcare building design. A scoping review of 4,506 papers, collected from four databases and three scientific journals in 2015, resulted in 14 papers relating health promotion to building design and outpatient healthcare. From the subsequent content analysis, multiple common themes and subthemes emerged. The review reveals diverse range of health promotion interpretations, three health promotion perspectives (health behavior, health equity, and sense of coherence), associated design approaches, design objectives, health-related outcomes, building features, and solutions. While diverse health promotion perspectives might merely represent variations in focus, these differences become problematic when relating to building design. To support further dialogs on development of health promotion in, and in relation to, the build environment, there is a need to strengthen the health promotion vocabulary. Further research is needed to compare different design approaches and how these can be combined to minimize contradicting implications for building design.

Indoor environmental quality performance and occupants’ satisfaction [IEQPOS] as assessment criteria for green healthcare building rating

A building as shelter is designed to provide an indoor environmental quality (IEQ) that is comfortable and appealing to its users. Having the understanding of the relationship between IEQ performance in buildings and the overall satisfaction derivable from the environment by the building occupants are necessary variables that will enhance the formulation of the requirements for architectural and building systems design and control. This study is aimed at developing a conceptual framework model for evaluating the performance of IEQ and occupants' satisfaction in hospital ward buildings. This conceptual framework is based on hypothesised model constructs, using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and Structural Regression Models (SRM). The data were analysed, using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). The analysis of the different specified model constructs in the framework resulted in an evaluation model for IEQ performance (IEQPM) and occupants' satisfaction (IEQPOS) in hospital ward buildings. The IEQPM model indicated that thermal quality, acoustic quality, visual quality, and indoor air quality (IAQ) are significant determinants of IEQ performance indirectly measured through the interrelationship among ten different indoor environment indicators. However, the level of importance of the four parameters of the IEQ performance differed, having different weighting factors of 0.61, 0.53, 0.40, and 0.47. The significant relationship between IEQ performance and occupants' satisfaction as established by the IEQPOS model resulted into a single index score value called ‘Comprehensive Occupant Satisfaction’ Index (COSI) which can be used for the assessment of occupancy comfort survey aspect of IEQ criteria in green building rating system.

White paper on the future of plasma science for optics and glass

This paper reflects on the future of low‐temperature plasma science in relation to the manufacturing and novel uses of glass. The text summarizes the current state of the art on the major topics discussed, such as glass processing, optics and photonics, healthcare issues, building and fenestration applications. It also identifies several challenges that are driven by applications, and which are compatible with roadmaps for their respective industries. The frontiers of plasma science are discussed, for example, in relation to the use of plasmas as an active optical element in fast‐response adaptive optics systems, optical metamaterials, and the development of next‐generation nanolithography. Future demand for the successful implementation of plasma‐based technologies in the glass, optics, and photonic industries will depend on further progress in plasma science. Hence, some needs and recommendations concerning both fundamental and applied plasma research are summarized.

Analytical study on design deficiencies in the envelope projects of healthcare buildings in spain

The deficiencies in the design of a building influence its environmental sustainability. In this paper we examine the design failures which are common in the envelope of healthcare centres of Extremadura, Spain, by analysing a homogeneous sample of 17 projects of public healthcare centres sized between 350 m2 and 3500 m2. All healthcare centres’ envelopes were comprised of brick facades and flat roofs. A total of 344 incidences were found in the sample, related to 51 control parameters. The average number of incidences per project was of 14. It was noted that 29% of the projects reviewed were of high quality, 53% of intermediate quality and 18% of poor quality. A significant amount of the detected failures had to do with the ‘omission’ of data (39%) or with the lack of ‘definition’ in the stipulations (25%). It has been demonstrated that larger and costlier healthcare centre projects usually have higher quality designs with fewer critical errors, independently of their geographical location and construction year. This research allows to identify the projects’ aspects which can lead to errors in the envelope during the healthcare centres’ service life. Furthermore, a tool has been developed to minimise failures in the design stage, preventing their later appearance.

Convex Programming and Bootstrap Sensitivity for Optimized Electricity Bill in Healthcare Buildings under a Time-Of-Use Pricing Scheme

Efficient energy management is strongly dependent on determining the adequate power contracts among the ones offered by different electricity suppliers. This topic takes special relevance in healthcare buildings, where noticeable amounts of energy are required to generate an adequate health environment for patients and staff. In this paper, a convex optimization method is scrutinized to give a straightforward analysis of the optimal power levels to be contracted while minimizing the electricity bill cost in a time-of-use pricing scheme. In addition, a sensitivity analysis is carried out on the constraints in the optimization problems, which are analyzed in terms of both their empirical distribution and their bootstrap-estimated statistical distributions to create a simple-to-use tool for this purpose, the so-called mosaic-distribution. The evaluation of the proposed method was carried out with five-year consumption data on two different kinds of healthcare buildings, a large one given by Hospital Universitario de Fuenlabrada, and a primary care center, Centro de Especialidades el Arroyo, both located at Fuenlabrada (Madrid, Spain). The analysis of the resulting optimization shows that the annual savings achieved vary moderately, ranging from −0.22 % to +27.39%, depending on the analyzed year profile and the healthcare building type. The analysis introducing mosaic-distribution to represent the sensitivity score also provides operative information to evaluate the convenience of implementing energy saving measures. All this information is useful for managers to determine the appropriate power levels for next year contract renewal and to consider whether to implement demand response mechanisms in healthcare buildings.

Modeling the Impacts of Local Factors for Healthcare Building Energy Performance Improvement in Thailand

This research aims to perform, compare, and evaluate Integrated Building Design (IBD) processes, collaborating the Building Information Modeling (BIM) with Building Performance Simulation (BPS) applications to perform energy analysis and to improve the building energy performance of a Generalizable Building Design (GBD), a universal application on health care facilities design in Thailand. The IBD processes produce the simulation results in a harmonious direction. Slight variation in building orientation could alter the extent of energy consumption. The integration of the three measures could minimize energy consumption greatly. The study addresses the limitations of the IBDs in the software integration processes.

Economic and Environmental Impact of Energy Saving in Healthcare Buildings

The purpose of this article is to estimate the economic and environmental impacts of energy consumption derived from healthcare buildings and proposes several energy-saving options in the sector. An experimental energy consumption study was development between 2005 and 2013 in 12 hospitals and 70 healthcare centres in Spain, built between 1980 and 2005 through audits carried out between 2005 and 2012, performed by the Extremadura Energy Agency. The study focused on electric energy, HVAC, DWH, lighting systems, renewable energies, maintenance strategy, thermal insulation, and optimal building size. Specifically, the following parameters were evaluated: energy savings, investment emission of CO2, NO2, and SO2 gases, and payback. The results revealed that through an appropriate energy management of healthcare buildings it is possible to save up to 8.60 kWh/m2 per year, for buildings of less than 5000 m2 (with no beds), which represents an expense of 1.55 €/m2. In healthcare buildings larger than 5000 m2 (with beds), it was possible to save up to 6.88 kWh/m2 per year, which represents an expense of 1.25 €/m2.

Moving epidemic method (MEM) applied to virology data as a novel real time tool to predict peak in seasonal influenza healthcare utilisation. The Scottish experience of the 2017/18 season to date.

Scotland observed an unusual influenza A(H3N2)-dominated 2017/18 influenza season with healthcare services under significant pressure. We report the application of the moving epidemic method (MEM) to virology data as a tool to predict the influenza peak activity period and peak week of swab positivity in the current season. This novel MEM application has been successful locally and is believed to be of potential use to other countries for healthcare planning and building wider community resilience.

Analyzing and Forecasting Electrical Load Consumption in Healthcare Buildings

Healthcare buildings exhibit a different electrical load predictability depending on their size and nature. Large hospitals behave similarly to small cities, whereas primary care centers are expected to have different consumption dynamics. In this work, we jointly analyze the electrical load predictability of a large hospital and that of its associated primary care center. An unsupervised load forecasting scheme using combined classic methods of principal component analysis (PCA) and autoregressive (AR) modeling, as well as a supervised scheme using orthonormal partial least squares (OPLS), are proposed. Both methods reduce the dimensionality of the data to create an efficient and low-complexity data representation and eliminate noise subspaces. Because the former method tended to underestimate the load and the latter tended to overestimate it in the large hospital, we also propose a convex combination of both to further reduce the forecasting error. The analysis of data from 7 years in the hospital and 3 years in the primary care center shows that the proposed low-complexity dynamic models are flexible enough to predict both types of consumption at practical accuracy levels.