38 PROJECT REPORT: HEALTHCARE BUILDINGS
environment,” including tall ceilings, high level window vents, and exposed thermal mass to reduce summer overheating. Substantial amounts of insulation to the envelope are supplemented by air source heat pumps and a roof “covered” with PV panels, but concealed behind the parapet – all contributing to the building’s BREEAM Excellent score.
In addition to the renewable energy measures, and low-energy use design, use of natural materials where possible (such as oak finishes internally) helped contribute to the BREEAM score. However, so did the building’s promotion of physical health, including how the open, prominent stair helps encourage users to use it rather than the lift. Good views, enhanced by increased biodiversity, and access to outdoor space are further contributors. In addition, many windows can be opened safely to provide natural ventilation.
The ward plan “gives staff and patients the
opportunity to back away from escalating and challenging situations”
supports a first floor terrace that is enclosed with a curtain wall, providing a space that feels larger than it is, giving expansive views over the courtyard beyond and below.
Promoting holistic health & wellbeing
As part of a general focus on keeping patients physically active, a variety of appropriately ‘inclusive’ exercise equipment is provided to the courtyards – both on the glazed terrace and on the first floor level. With their greater independence, patients are able to do healthy activity outdoors at a time that suits them.
The layout allows daylight to reach into the core of the building, enabling users to feel a “connection with the hours of the day, the seasons, and the changing weather,” say the architects. The interiors have been designed to provide “calm, organic environments,” with natural oak finishes where feasible.
Futureproofing & sustainability The building has been designed with efficiency in mind, but also to be as flexible and adaptable as possible for future changes to the trust’s healthcare provision. Wards are designed to a standard template, and stacked to share risers, but that standardisation allows services to “swap or adapt in the future,” say the architects. Medical Architecture’s masterplan also provides a “route for future redevelopment of further inpatient accommodation with an additional three blocks.”
Passive design measures used include “low-tech solutions to control the internal
WWW.ARCHITECTSDATAFILE.CO.UK Conclusion
Achieving the balance between safety, security and high-quality environments for users and staff in acute mental health units is never easy. However Medical Architecture deployed their deep knowledge to transform the provision at St Ann’s Hospital, to provide a sense of space, and independence to users and staff. Not only that, a focus on healthy activities alongside wellness meant the unit can offer a different level of support to hopefully ensure that users leave the unit in a better physical state than they arrived in. Part of the success of this project is down
to the “great involvement” of clinicians with the design process, says Reeves, including the architects sharing VR visualisations, and providing a series of room mock-ups during design development, before the contract’s ‘guaranteed maximum price’ was arrived at. “We were able to refine the design, then post-GMP, work with subcontractors, particularly windows and joinery, to get the details just right.” Testimony from one user shows the power of a simple, ‘first-principles’ approach to better quality environments: “The design of the new wards with ensuite bathrooms, more daylight and views of nature will reduce patient stress, anxiety and pain. This will all help to shorten the time service users need to stay.”
The real proof is that since opening, the project architect says the hospital has had “significantly lower levels” of incidents where patients needed to be secluded or tranquilised,” and physical restraint has “almost entirely stopped.”
ADF JANUARY 2022
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