Blueprint for care

As the new Huntsman Cancer Hospital rises above the University of Utah campus, workers are busy installing the most up-to-date technology, some pieces so big and complicated they require their own room.

Still, admits Dr. Stephen Prescott, executive director of the adjacent Huntsman Cancer Institute, the loading dock and the driveway are among his favorite features.

Did you know, he asks a reporter, that the driveway took a 36-hour continuous pour of concrete?

Upstairs, he shows off a handful of VIP suites, complete with anterooms for bodyguards or support staff. Even the regular patient rooms have couches near the windows, ready to fold out into sleepers for visiting family members. And there's a patio that planners hope the community will use for gatherings or press conferences or whatever, all wrapped in an incredible view of the valley.

While some parts of the economy slog along, medical construction is booming.

When the construction is done and you're sitting on the patio at the McKay-Dee Hospital in Ogden, sipping a soda and watching the birds nearby, or hooked to an intravenous line receiving chemotherapy at Huntsman Cancer Institute, the purple and yellow wildflowers on the mountain providing a view, be sure of one thing. The atmosphere was not a happy accident.

It's health care by design, a growing specialty in the broad field of architecture. Private corridors for patients or laundry facilities for family members, how close the patient bed is to the door and whether equipment is in easy reach of staff are all the result of a thoughtful and often time-consuming design process.

Recently, the Deseret Morning News sat down with a half-dozen local architects who design medical buildings in Utah and elsewhere to talk about what makes it different and what those differences mean to patients and their families, as well as the care providers who may spend more time in a health facility than they do at home.

Big changes, better care

When Don Finlayson began designing health-care facilities 30 years ago, the latest thing in patient privacy and comfort was putting only two people into a hospital room, instead of the traditional four.

Forget that thin curtain that separates beds in older hospitals. Facilities designed today nearly always have single-patient rooms, though there's likely to be some built-in space for stay-over family members. Where intensive-care nurses used to tell architects not to encourage families to stay, even ICUs may include room for a family member in the design.

Lobbies are larger, brighter, taller, often open for two or more floors. They look more like hotel lobbies with cozy chairs and loads of greenery.