hospital impact

by Nick Jacobs

As a young teacher, it was increasingly difficult for me to understand the system. It never made sense to me that the publicly funded buildings in which we worked were not made available to the community 24/7. After all, these buildings were purchased by the public funds but, for the most part, except for those special days when games or programs were scheduled, the buildings were locked up every afternoon and evening.

After leaving education and migrating to health care, I had an opportunity to hear Ken Dychtwald of the "Age Wave" speak in 1988 about the fact that hospitals were, for the most part, not available to be utilized appropriately by the people who ultimately paid for them and not built to take care of the aging population. The lighting was not appropriate, the stairs were not the correct rise, the furniture was built for people in their 30's, and, most importantly, they were used primarily for acute situations.

He talked about a new hospital that had been built in Scottsdale and how it had a regular driveway and a golf cart driveway. He spoke about how it was built to attract the community. It was a special experiment, and this presentation captured my imagination. Why NOT?

Over the past ten years we have added a community work out facility, a wellness center; labyrinths, gazebos, walking trails, fountains, meditation gardens, a caring park, therapy pool, and hills filled with flowers. Inside we used furniture that fit the average age of our patients, invited the Area Agency on Aging to move into our building, a building that we condo- minimized, for them. We built several community rooms, added an indoor walking track, decorative fountains and gardens inside and out and then worked to educate our market service area to utilize our space as their own.

My favorite memory of this entire community project came on the day that we had a dozen prisoners from the county jail carving out the walking trails in the back. It began to rain and the Department of Corrections provided them with bright yellow rain coats with the D.O.C. abbreviation on the back. One of our patients walked up to me, umbrella in hand and said, "How wonderful it is that your physicians would take the time to build a walking trail for you."

Moral of the story? Make all hospitals community centers for health and wellness. The pictures for the Senior (Citizen) Prom are taken inside on our grand staircases by the indoor gardens. Meanwhile, the High School Senior Prom pictures are taken outside by the magnificent fountain. Our employees use the outdoor areas for picnics, mental health breaks, drumming circles, and generally for overall personal healing. And that’s the way it should be.