By Alvin Chumari
Cardboard boxes aren’t something you think about unless you are the ‘karung guni’ man or if you are planning a move. But for our Sengkang General Hospital (SKH) colleagues, cardboard boxes proved invaluable in the early stages of hospital planning to test space requirements and patient flow.
Modular and portable, these cardboard boxes were easy to assemble and tear down, compared to actual plaster walls or furniture. They were also cost effective and helped staff better visualise their surroundings.
Simulations for better design
The use of cardboard furniture was part of a bigger, mock-up simulation exercise conducted by the SKH team. With the help of a local cardboard sculptor, these setups were put up at the temporary site office at the hospital grounds and included role-playing by infrastructure and planning executives, nurses, doctors, architects and building consultants. Even Sengkang residents were involved and acted as patients and caregivers.
“The mock-ups were made to be as real as possible. Acting as patients, caregivers and clinicians in various scenarios, we reacted and behaved as if we were responding to real medical situations while giving suggestions to improve patient flow along the way,” recalled Nurse Clinician Tan Khee Khee.
An example of an improvement made to the hospital’s design as a result was making the blood-taking station in the consultation area roomier and offer more privacy for patients. The testing of workflows based on different patient scenarios allowed staff to identify potential bottlenecks at various patient touch points and to improve on them.
SKH colleagues are now ramping up to open the largest integrated hospital serving the northeast area and come the second half of 2018, residents, patients and caregivers can look forward to a hospital that is built around their needs and with them in mind.
So the next time you come across empty cardboard boxes, don’t be too quick to dismiss them as junk. As SKH has shown, they may be a lot more useful than you think.
