Supportive Environmental Design Strategies and Case Studies for Ensuring the Safety and Health of Healthcare workers

Abstract

Caregivers have been exposed to tremendous stress in their daily work. Similar with that of the patients, the staffs also are treated as individuals who need appropriate respite environment and psychological support to mitigate work stress. Therefore, by overviewing the caregiver safety environment, as a method for the study, theories and design concepts are reviewed with noticeable design cases that reflect the theories as a supportive environment design strategy; social support, self-control, and positive distraction. Moreover, the types of design strategies are summarized for their application and whom the result expected regarding wellbeing of staff. Consequently, the design strategies are shown two noticeable groups. The design concept and goal on to support the staffs’ safe environment used to focus on stress reduction by access to nature and create readily accessible respite space for meditation. The staffs can use these spaces to meditate, collect their thoughts, and recharge before returning to the stressful patient care area. Another type of the design concept is to create a concrete stress prevention environment by proving the work efficiency design and work safety zone from an accidently occurred violence. However, those two types of design strategies actually reflect mutual influence. To maintain the staff’s wellbeing, it is naturally accepted and shared that the value of supportive environment design is essentially considered as the same as that of an economical or functional hospital product.