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INFRASTRUCTURE: DESIGN
the staff and on at the same time the exclusive and constant
attention of the family and friends all day long. Thus,
hospitals, especially the ones that have been recently
established, are trying to adjust a small sitting area in the
patient room with armchairs, which can be turned into
beds. In Asklepieia this was recognised. On a ancient stone
carving it is possible to see a patient with his family and his
favourite pet being welcomed by a priest-doctor and a snake
symbolising a welcome from the god Asklepios himself. The
family, friends and pets could stay at the Xenon, meaning
hotel, which was provided on the Asklepieion campus. The
patient, depending on the gravity of its situation, would stay
for the first stages of his diagnosis and general support of his
health, with them in this hotel.
Conclusion
The achievement of a culture of safety seems to be at the
centre of the current interest of the health industry
professionals. This effort requires the contribution of every
component of health care industry. One of those
components is recognized to be the planning and design of
health care facilities. The purpose of this study was to
understand the planning and design of health care facilities
contribution to the achievement of a culture of safety, in
general, and in two of Thessaloniki’s Hospitals, in particular.
Patient safety is threatened globally by several factors, such
as those related to terrorist actions, the natural resources
pollution and the nosocomial or hospital acquired infections.
Out of them the nosocomial infections seem the most likely
to threaten patient safety in Thessaloniki’s Hospitals.
The method used was developed in two ways concerning
the analysis of the quantitative and qualitative roles of the
planning and design of health care facilities. The results have
shown that the quantitative role of the planning and design’s
contribution is extremely important in quantitative issues of
the hospital infection control programme, such as the
elimination of the possible relatively high concentration of
the pathogens.
Additionally, the qualitative role of the planning and
design contribution has a major influence on the qualitative
issues of the hospital infection control programme, such as
the strengthening of the patients’ immune system, and
consequently their resistance to an infection, through
focusing on improvements of a more relaxed and with a high
aesthetic quality health care environment. This is supported
by the reassurance provided by the contribution of the local
cultural identity.
Finally, we may conclude that the achievement of a
culture of safety requires not only projects and studies
aiming to re-design clinical processes but also to the
building of a safer health care environment, which can
properly accommodate and support both quantitatively and
qualitatively those clinical processes reinforced by the
lessons derived by the experience of historical examples,
such as the Asklepieia.
However, with the known attachment of our current
civilization to the direct, preferably, economic benefit we are
going away from the humanistic example of Asklepios and
Asklepieia. Nowadays, the patient is characterized as a
‘client’ or ‘consumer’ and the planning and design as ‘cost’
or ‘investment’. What do we observe here? All the terms
used are economic. Does this imply that perhaps the future
aim, as far as health care is concerned, is simply profit? For
strengthening the immune system of the patients one
should not forget Hippokrates position, when he insisted
that ‘it is not beneficial to count everything in money’.
Otherwise the whole system could turn from humanoriented
to profit-oriented and thus be inhuman. ❑
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