A Comprehensive Perspective On Innovation In Hospital Building Design: Recognizing The Background Of The Gap Between Research And Practice

Abstract

In the architecture industry, few sectors demand innovation and adaptability like healthcare design. The evolution of healthcare architecture has been marked by a constant pursuit of creating spaces that not only accommodate medical needs but also prioritize patient comfort, staff efficiency, and overall wellness. As we step into a new era, several trends are reshaping modern healthcare design, paving the way for enhanced healing environments. There is still a problem with moving research into innovations, even though there is an obvious demand for better hospital building design. The relationship between research and other factors influencing design innovation is not well understood, even though the literature identifies the Research/Practice divide as the key challenge. Taking a broader view of design, this research seeks to comprehend the innovation system in healthcare facility architecture. The Integral Design Framework was utilized to analyze the relationships between research and innovation in 77 highly cited articles. This was subsequently employed to plot the factors influencing two groundbreaking epochs in the history of hospital architecture. The findings paint an oversimplified image of innovation, implying that it happens at the intersections of diverse knowledge domains. Social changes, political decisions, architectural design trends, medical and technology breakthroughs are some of the essential aspects that have been found to affect new knowledge, which in turn has led to inventions. Research informing the design of hospital buildings has not had a holistic viewpoint, according to analyses using the Integral Design Framework, which has stifled design innovation. In order to spur innovation and reduce the Research/Practice divide, it is essential to re-formulate research questions in a more comprehensive manner.