Planning ambulatory care clinics in children’s hospitals

Considerations in designing ambulatory care spaces in children’s hospitals are discussed by principals with FKP Architects.  There are some data gems:

• Outpatient services are expected to grow about 23 percent over the next decade (this is quoted from The Advisory Board)
• There is a chart showing national benchmark ranges for visits per exam room by specialty in pediatric ambulatory clinics (this is from FKP’s proprietary database).  [IMPORTANT NOTE: This chart is in the print version of the article only.]
• If you’re designing a facility in which staff have to walk more than 250 to 300 feet horizontally, it’s time to think about vertical stacking
• It’s possible to achieve average clinic room utilization of 75 to 80 percent with adult patients, but for pediatrics, the best children’s hospitals are doing 50 to 60 percent and the average is more like 40 to 50 percent.

Why I like this article:  I spent much of my career as an information specialist working for hospital consulting firms and we always liked to find little data nuggets like this.

Source: Stavins, C., Osan, D.R.K., and Fannin, T.  Mission critical: fixing ambulatory care.  Healthcare Design;11(6):87+, June 2011.  Posted by AHA Resource Center, (312) 422-2050, rc@aha.org