Editorial

Citation

Lavy, S. (2013), "Editorial", Facilities, Vol. 31 No. 13/14. https://doi.org/10.1108/F-06-2013-0049

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Facilities, Volume 31, Issue 13/14

This issue of Facilities covers different aspects of healthcare facility management. First and foremost, the primary purpose of healthcare facilities is to provide the best possible service to the patients. The facility management team, therefore, is crucial in providing that care, and must be viewed as an integral part of patient care in order to be effective. In an era of tightening cost and increasing quality regulation requirements in the healthcare industry, facility managers will be critical in establishing and maintaining value and driving overall costs down.

The journal Facilities has already published one special issue in the past, dealing with the value of facilities and estates to patient care and well-being (Volume 27 Issue 3/4, published in 2009). Since then, several other papers have been published that covered various aspects of healthcare facility management. The current issue presents six research papers that are related to the broader topic of healthcare FM. Papers in this issue discuss topic of: design and construction guidelines for healthcare facilities in Australia, visually impaired park users in Hong Kong, PPP/PFI procurement methods of hospitals in the UK and Australia, facilities for children with Autism Spectrum Disorders in the USA and the UK, risk factors for elderly population facilities in Hong Kong, and performance measurements in hospitals in Australia.

A paper by Carthey studies the effectiveness of the Australian Health Facility Guidelines, released in late 2006. Australia, like some other countries, established a nationally-recognized guide for the design and construction of healthcare facilities. The paper discusses the results of a survey conducted in three out of the nine health jurisdictions in Australia, where participants were asked to rate various characteristics of the guidelines and to provide their comments on it. This study can be used as a framework to follow by those that do not have such guidelines, and also by the Australian Health Facility Guidelines committee to improve on what they already have.

Parks and recreation activities are the subject of public discussions and debates. A paper by Siu addresses the issue that people with special needs, mainly visual impairment, should also gain fair and equal access to the benefits parks offer to the larger public. The author uses multiple research methods to collect data from, including case-studies, field observations, interviews with government officials, professionals (planners and designers), and visually impaired people. This study provides references and directions for policy-makers and designers on how they should plan, design and manage parks for visually impaired users, and therefore, its findings can be implemented even outside Hong Kong.

Procurement methods of hospital projects are the subject of a paper by Javed, Lam, and Chan. In their paper, the authors present a model framework for creating output specifications for public sector hospital projects using PPP/PFI financing. The paper uses data collected from hospital projects built in the UK and Australia. The analysis of this data resulted in a list of essential issues to be considered for projects using this procurement method. As more and more public hospital organizations consider financing their projects through PPP/PFI, this paper can be utilized by them as a preliminary framework for developing such types of agreements.

Children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) are the focus of a paper by Shabha and Gaines. Their study aims at evaluating the association between visual and acoustic/auditory learning environments and the behavior of students with ASD. This is conducted while studying the similarities and differences between two distinct geographic locations: Texas, USA, and West Midlands, UK. In their study, the authors used a survey questionnaire to collect data from special education teachers, care-givers, and staff members. The study identifies key factors which designers, users, facility managers, and policy-makers should be aware of while dealing with issues of design, construction, and operations of such spaces for this unique population.

A paper by Leung, Chan, and Olomolaiye deals with the quality of facilities for elderly population in care homes in Hong Kong. Even though government funding allocations for such facilities exists, it seems like funds are not being spent appropriately. Therefore, this paper investigates the relationships between risk factors and facility management components in care homes. While the authors considered a wide range of FM components, the ones found to be the most significant are space planning, noise level, signage, and catering. It is also interesting to read how the authors make the link between these components and different types of clinical diseases and their resulting risk factors.

Performance measurement is considered an essential tool to evaluate the effectiveness of facility management. A paper by Talib, Rajagopalan and Yang aims at evaluating the effect that different components have on building performance. By studying one of the largest regional health providers in Victoria, Australia, the authors were able to collect data about the perceptions of hospital staff on each component within three aspects of building performance: functionality, impact and quality. This study can be used to help identifying areas of improvement in building performance, both for hospital facilities in the area of Victoria, Australia, and beyond.

Sarel Lavy
Co-Editor