Publication type: "Keynote Presentations"

University of Toronto Zeidler-Evans Annual Architecture of Health Lecture: Designing for Older Persons in a Transforming World

October 17, 2024 / Dochitect / Design for Geriatrics

Presentations

Event: Invited Keynote Speaker, University of Toronto Zeidler-Evans Annual Architecture of Health Lecture
Title: Designing for Older Persons in a Transforming World
Date: October 17, 2024

Speaker Bios

Diana Anderson, MD, M.Arch, FACHA

Dr. Diana Anderson is a triple boarded professional – healthcare architect (ACHA-American College of Healthcare Architects), internist, and a geriatrician. She earned her MD from the University of Toronto (OT8). As a “dochitect,”she pioneered a collaborative, evidence-based model for approaching healthcare from the medicine and architecture fields simultaneously. A past Fellow of the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics, Diana explores the ethics of built space related to design for aging. She is currently an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Boston University, and a recipient of an Alzheimer’s Association Clinician Scientist Fellowship. She is a healthcare principal at Jacobs, contributing her thought leadership at the intersection of design and health.

Molly Chan

Molly Chan is a principal with the firm of NSDA Architects, a diverse and dynamic architectural practice based in Vancouver, BC. A six-time recipient of the Lieutenant Governor’s award, the firm focuses on a wide range of projects including special needs, social purpose housing, affordable rental, healthcare and multi-family residential. Current projects include YWCA Housing for Women and Children, The Salvation Army Harbour Light facility, and Foxglove Supported Housing and Shelter.

Stephen Verderber, Arch,D., NCARB, ACSA Distinguished Professor

Dr. Stephen Verderber is Professor of Architecture, Director of the Centre for Design + Health Innovation in the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design, and Adjunct Professor in the Dalla Lana School of Public Health/IHPME at the University of Toronto. A Registered Architect in the U.S. and co-founder of R-2ARCH (Research to Architecture), he is sole author of seven books, co-author of two, and has published over one-hundred peer reviewed scholarly and professional articles. His most recent books are Innovations in Transportable Healthcare Architecture (2016), Innovations in Behavioural Health Architecture (2018) and Innovations in Hospice Architecture (Second Edition, 2020). His first book, Healthcare Architecture in an Era of Radical Transformation (2000), has become a standard reference. Principal investigator of numerous externally sponsored research projects and reports, he holds one of only two North American faculty cross-appointments linking architecture and public health. Dr. Verderber has delivered invited keynotes at numerous international conferences on evidence-based health research and design, educational pedagogy, eco-humanist health-centric design, and has received numerous awards for his interdisciplinary contributions to the advancement of the discipline, profession, and broader community.

Keynote Presentations

Politecnico di Milano – Keynote speaker at 15th anniversary event for post-graduate Masters in Hospital Design

October 2, 2024 / Dochitect / Evidence-Based Design

Presentations

Event: Politecnico di Milano: 15th anniversary of post-graduate Masters in Hospital Design program
Title: Architectural Design as a Determinant of Health
Date: October 2, 2024

See full program HERE.

Keynote Presentations

RAIC 2022 Keynote: Architectural Design as a Determinant of Heath

June 8, 2022 / Dochitect / Design for Geriatrics

Presentations

Event: Invited Keynote Speaker, Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC) Long Term Care Working Group, RAIC 2022 Virtual Conference on Architecture
Title: Architectural Design as a Determinant of Heath
Date: June 8, 2022

Lecture Overview

A growing body of empirical data and evidence-based design research demonstrates that architecture impacts care delivery as well as health outcomes. This talk explores built space as an important determinant of health and questions whether the built environment itself should be considered alongside other parameters of care, analogous to our medical interventions. A current focus on design equity, ensuring overall accessibility to healthcare built space, is explored. It is imperative that we consider a convergence of the healthcare and design disciplines in order to promote novel solutions to augment built environment resilience and subsequently support equitable, safe and efficient care delivery.

Learning Objectives

Describe how built space is an important determinant of health, to be considered alongside other parameters of care
Identify empirical data linking the built environment with health outcomes
Consider ethical questions raised with long term care design, particularly in the setting of cognitive impairment
Classify design for health within the existing clinical 5M framework

For more information see the conference program HERE.

Keynote Presentations

Symposium on Sustainability in Healthcare – Architectural Design as a Determinant of Heath

May 25, 2021 / Dochitect / Design for Resiliency, Design for the Future of Health, Evidence-Based Design

Presentations

Event: Symposium on Sustainability in Healthcare
Title: Architectural Design as a Determinant of Heath
Date: May 25, 2021

KEYNOTE LUNCH – 11:30 AM – 1:00 PM

Keynote Presentation: “Architectural Design as a Determinant of Health”

Presenter: Diana Anderson, MD, M.Arch

Our understanding of the role the environment plays in shaping health has expanded immensely over the last few decades. A growing body of empirical data and evidence-based design research demonstrates that architecture impacts care delivery as well as health outcomes.

This talk explores built space as an important determinant of health and questions whether the built environment itself should be considered alongside other parameters of care, analogous to our medical interventions. Historical examples of the convergence of hospital architecture and medical practice exist. The design of the tuberculosis sanatorium during the early 20th century illustrates this infrequent intersection; the healthy building emphasizing contact with nature, developed to prevent the spread of contagions.

In the context of the COVID-19 global pandemic, we can revisit past models and consider new and sustainable innovations to emphasize infection prevention and control. A current focus on design equity, ensuring overall accessibility to healthcare-built space, is explored through universal design principles. It is imperative that we consider a convergence of the healthcare and design disciplines in order to promote novel solutions to augment-built environment resilience and subsequently support equitable, safe and efficient care delivery.

More information about the event is available HERE.

Keynote Presentations

Healthcare Architecture: A Moral Imperative

January 31, 2020 / Dochitect / Health Design & Ethics

Presentations

Event: Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics – Seminar Series
Title: Healthcare Architecture: A Moral Imperative
Date: January 31, 2020

There is increasing recognition and understanding of the impact built space has on people.

Healthcare architecture has strongly advocated for patient-centered design, but can the resulting concealment of clinical spaces devalue the role of medical professionals? With a recent paradigm shift towards design quality measurement, has the social responsibility of health architects changed?

Obligations to develop an ethically-based framework to structure design decisions and allocation discussions in healthcare architecture are explored.

Keynote Presentations, Lectures

Habitats for Healers: Architectural Design for Clinicians

October 28, 2019 / Dochitect / Design for Clinical Staff

Presentations

Event: CENTILE (Center for Innovation and Leadership in Education)
Title: Habitats for Healers: Architectural Design for Clinicians
Location: Georgetown University
Date: October 28, 2019

Evidence-based design has focused on the patient experience, but what is the impact of architecture on those delivering care?

This Plenary presentation by Dr. Anderson focuses on aspects of healthcare architecture which impact the experience of delivering care and clinician well-being. Can space design help address some aspects of the burnout and moral distress experienced by providers of care? What is the role of the clinician in the healthcare architecture process?

Clinicians are increasingly asking to acquire new skill-sets and knowledge in design thinking to develop novel modes of practice and models of care. Dr. Anderson explores how cross-disciplinary collaboration between the architect and the clinician provides a mechanism for positive change in healthcare.

Keynote Presentations

Design Museum Boston – The Architecture of Health

January 25, 2019 / Dochitect / Evidence-Based Design, The Physician-Architect Model

Presentations

Event: Design Museum Boston
Title: The Architecture of Health
Date: January 25, 2019

Design Museum Mornings with Diana Anderson, MD, M.Arch, healthcare architect, and a board-certified internist.

Can architecture impact health? Increasingly, clinicians are asking not only for the architect’s perspective, but to develop a skill-set and knowledge-base that will allow them to help shape the future of health. Architects aim to engage clinical professionals in research, education, and practice. For some patients, design can succeed where drugs may fail. For clinicians, the built environment can support and improve efficient care delivery. We all have a shared goal in seeking to enhance health outcomes through innovations in the design of healthcare spaces.

Dochitect speaks at the Design Museum Boston Morning event about The Architecture of Health!

Keynote Presentations, Lectures

Therapeutic Sanatorium Design: Where Hospital Architecture & Medical Practice Converge

February 25, 2017 / Dochitect / Evidence-Based Design, The Physician-Architect Model

Presentations

Organization: Texas A&M Health Science Center
Event: 2nd International History of Medicine Symposium
Location: Bryan, Texas
Date: February 25, 2017

Dochitect delivers the Keynote Address at the 2nd International Symposium on the History of Medicine and Related Disciplines, presenting the historical convergence between Medicine and Architecture.

As Keynote Speaker, Dochitect was introduced by Kirk Hamilton, Fellow & Associate Director of the Center for Health Systems & Design and Professor of Architecture at Texas A&M University.

ABSTRACT

Historical overview
The notion of our health is no longer identified primarily by the absence of illness, but instead has expanded to include a general state of well-being. In medicine, as in architecture, it seems that our ambition for total well-being has become fragmented, due in part to the subspecialisation of medical science, in addition to the rise of complex chronic illness and the need for multiple buildings types for delivering care- from our homes to traditional hospital buildings and now freestanding ambulatory centers.

The sanatorium as therapeutic architecture
The histories of hospital architecture and medical practices have rarely converged. The design of the tuberculosis sanatorium during the early 20^th century illustrates this infrequent intersection; the healthy building emphasizing contact with nature, developed to prevent the spread of contagions by isolating patients and preparing them for a return to normal life. As it preceded the era of antibiotic therapy, the sanatorium model did not necessarily offer any true effective treatment. With the advent of pharmaceutical treatments and critical care technology, hospital design moved into a more industrial period of machine-like centers designed to provide all levels of life-sustaining care. While medical science can often disguise mortality with technology, we are now revisiting the sanatorium model to de-medicalize architecture.

The future of healthy design
How do clinicians and architects find a balance between illness, health, and design? To consider therapeutic design as a possible form of treatment requires participation of both the patient and the caregiver. It may be time to shift our thinking and develop healthcare architecture focused on prevention, rehabilitation, and independent living by taking lessons from the sanatorium model. A future in which design of collective spaces can promote this convergence of care alongside cure should be our goal.

Keynote Presentations

Healthcare Design from a Universal Design Approach

May 5, 2016 / Dochitect / Evidence-Based Design

In The News

Organization: The Centre for Excellence in Universal Design (CEUD)
Event: Presentation on Universal Design in Healthcare
Location: Dublin, Ireland
Date: May 5, 2016

Universal Design is the design and composition of an environment so that it can be accessed, understood and used to the greatest extent possible by all people regardless of their age, size, ability or disability.

During this presentation, Dochitect discusses the application of a Universal Design approach in healthcare environments. The presentation looked at how hospitals and healthcare buildings can be designed from a Universal Design approach in order to:

– Improve care delivery and patient experience
– Prevent clinician burnout
– Integrate caregivers and family needs
– Foster interdisciplinary collaboration for improved care
– Address the changing practice of healthcare
– Apply design-thinking to medicine for enhanced efficiency

Click here to view the presentation slides.

Click here to view the keynote presentation video.

Keynote Presentations

Designing for the Clinician

June 19, 2014 / Dochitect / Design for Clinical Staff

Presentations

Presentation Title: Designing for the Clinician
Event: Educational evening hosted by Steelcase Health & Waldners Business and Healthcare Environments
Presentation Date: June 19, 2014
Event Location: New York, NY

Dr. Anderson delivers a keynote address to the healthcare architectural community on designing for the clinician.

Topics of discussion include:

Bridging the gap between clinical practice and design
Design trends based on clinical practice anecdotes
Innovative design as influencer of change
Designing for the physical encounter within various clinical practices

Keynote Presentations