In my travels, I meet many people who are deeply familiar with The Center for Health Design, and many others who have not yet heard of us. And very often, in the mix, are those who may have heard of us, but aren’t quite sure what we do. In this guest column, we’ve been asked to share with you who we are, what we do, and where we fit within the industry just in case you aren’t familiar with the full scope of The Center’s work.
The Center for Health Design, is a non-profit 501c3 organization made up of passionate healthcare designers and allied professionals dedicated to improving the quality of healthcare through the design of the built environment. As a member-supported organization, we focus on the connection between design and health through research, tools, resources, training and advocacy for change.
The genesis of this organization was about creating a place to bring like-minded people from disparate but connected parts of our industry together. The idea was to create a gathering place to share ideas around how a healthcare environment could be designed to contribute to the quality of life.
Throughout our history, The Center has created, launched and delivered programs that promote the understanding and strategic application of design influencing healthcare performance, patient satisfaction, and staff productivity and safety. These key programs include the Pebble Project, the Built Environment Network (BEN), EDAC certification, healthcare design industry awards programs, the Affiliate membership program, active involvement in the Environmental Standards Council, the HERD Journal, Healthcare Design magazine, and Health Design Insights regional events along with a variety of online educational opportunities.
Evidence-Based Design Touchstone Award Ceremony 2017. Image credit: The Center for Health Design.
Industry partners are vital to helping us fulfill our mission of transforming healthcare environments through evidence-based design research, education and advocacy. These partners team up with us to produce conferences and magazines, create educational events, and fund both research and tool development. For example, in collaboration with our conference partner, Emerald Expositions, we produce two of the leading healthcare design-related educational programs and professional gatherings; the Healthcare Design Expo & Conference, and the Environments for Aging Expo & Conference, both programs that AIA Knowledge Communities have a hand in helping to shape programming for. We’ve also partnered the AIA AAH and other like-minded organizations, to create an online database of research citations and key point summaries known as the Knowledge Repository, available free to all, so that finding the citations to inform design decisions is not as complicated a process.
Another crucial element to the mission of The Center is the support of our Affiliate members. Our Affiliate member program provides opportunities for individuals and organizations of every size - from the student or single design practitioner, to the 1,000-bed acute care hospital, to the global healthcare product manufacturer - to advance their understanding of evidence-based design strategies and benefits, and to demonstrate their support of The Center's values and mission. In exchange, they receive access to a host of educational content, discounts and events.
Over the last 25 years, we’ve helped lead the evidence-based design movement in healthcare by initiating, directing and supporting research that documents and measures the impact the design of the physical environment has in improving healthcare outcomes and reducing costs. Our internationally recognized Evidence-Based Design Accreditation and Certification (EDAC) program awards certification to healthcare planners, architects, designers, contractors, and management professionals worldwide, who have demonstrated an understanding of applying an evidence-based design process to healthcare facilities. In 2017, we added to this credentialing program, the Evidence-Based Design Touchstone Award. This award distinguishes healthcare projects as stellar examples of design executed with the intention to improve the patient, family, and staff experience, health outcomes, and the overall value for all stakeholders and the organization. Awards are given to projects that demonstrate exemplary achievement across the touchstones of the evidence-based design process: collaboration, evaluation, and sharing.
Evidence-Based Design Touchstone Award Ceremony 2017. Image credit: The Center for Health Design.
From in-person, regional and national events, to virtual, live and on-demand educational sessions, we bring people together to share, learn, and advance best practices in healthcare design. In an ongoing effort to inspire, educate and grow our industry, we also offer the largest collection of healthcare design research, best practices, resources and tools and training to enable industry professionals to effectively evaluate, test, prioritize, implement, and optimize facility investments.
We’ve grown a great deal since our inception and with time our mission has sharpened and expanded, but at its nucleus, it’s still the same – how design can be used as a tool to improve the lives of people who come in contact with healthcare, no matter what form healthcare might take.
Today, our community is diverse. Thousands of architects, interior designers, healthcare providers, researchers, product manufacturers, educators, and students reference our work, use our tools, employ our strategies and tap our experts as they endeavor to improve healthcare through the design of the built environment. Healthcare design is changing for the better, and we only see this trend gaining momentum - making the healthcare experience better for millions around the world.
Sincerely,
Debra Levin, Hon FASID, EDAC
President and CEO / The Center for Health Design
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About the author
Since 1989, Debra’s trailblazing efforts in the field of healthcare facility design research, education and advocacy have propelled The Center for Health Design into industry consciousness and the forefront of evidence-based healthcare design.
Under Debra’s leadership, The Center’s research initiative, the Pebble Project, gained international recognition and the EDAC Certification program became the standard for evidence-based design practitioners in the healthcare and design industry. Debra helped found the annual Healthcare Design and Environments for Aging conferences and the Healthcare Design magazine.
Debra is a passionate advocate for how the design of the built environment can have a positive influence on outcomes on both human health and healthcare environments.