A Systematic Review and Conceptual Framework of Biophilic Design Parameters in Clinical Environments

Abstract

Objectives: To provide a live-experience knowledge base about biophilic design parameters and environmental features to inform policy and design in clinical therapeutic environments. Background: It is increasingly important to review hospital design to make the best use of the affordances of natural elements in supporting both patients’ and staff’s physical and psychological well-being. The biophilic design theory provides an appropriate design approach. However, current biophilic design frameworks fail to provide efficiently standardized guidance. This systematic review aims to examine the experience of hospital users (patients and staff) with a view to informing a standardized biophilic design framework to improve future design in this context. Methods: This study performed a review and synthesis of nine studies identified using systematic procedures focusing on biophilic design features in healthcare environments. Results: The study identified a selection of biophilic parameters specifically relevant to this building typology, according to three different user groups: outpatients (fresh air, light-daylight, thermal comfort, welcoming and relaxing), inpatients (feeling relaxed and comfortable, prospect refuge, security and protection, light-daylight, view), and staff (privacy-refuge, quietness). Conclusions: The systematically identified studies helped to identify and rank the biophilic design parameters that appear the most critical for promoting and supporting human health and well-being in clinical therapeutic environments from the user’s perspective. It also provides an up-to-date compilation of crucial design interventions related to biophilic parameters and as such provides benchmark information for future research and design guidance in these environments.

Human-centred health-care environments: a new framework for biophilic design

“…A narrative literature review, a systematically searched literature review, and a meta-synthesis analysis informed the scientific evidence using secondary sources, while professional practice and experience were investigated with primary data collected from semi-structured interviews. The separate findings from the meta-synthesis (Study 1) ( 36 ) and the systematically searched review (Study 2) ( 37 ) have been extensively discussed in two published articles, so this paper primarily focuses on how the outcomes of these two studies, together with the data obtained from the semi-structured interviews with practitioners (Study 3), generated the final framework as a design system.…”

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