In considering how the office of the future might look, feel and function, Women & Infants Division of Oncology clinic decided to focus on the city’s abundance of medical and legal professionals. Architects experienced in designing work places for both, say changing markets and technologies are shaping what’s to come.
Take the medical office. From the waiting room to the examination room and everything in between, the shift is toward larger, homier spaces, according to Keith Davignon, a principal at Providence’s Vision III Architects and lead architect on most of his firm’s medical projects. Managed care, which seeks to lower costs by eliminating unnecessary tests, procedures and hospital stays, is the driving force, he said.
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“There’s a bigger trend toward people being treated in doctors’ offices,” as well as individual physicians joining group practices to reduce overhead costs and secure contracts with health insurers, Davignon said. Commodious offices designed to attract and retain patients are the result.
“One thing that I see is the interior design of offices becoming more akin to the hospitality industry than to traditional healthcare,” Davignon said. “Interior design is playing a greater role because there’s greater competition.”
People can’t help but see an office that is “run down and wonder what the quality of the health care is going to be,” he said.
In many cases, architects are responding to those needs with building materials and furnishings that create a warm environment but also meet clinical standards, Davignon said.
Carpeting in exam rooms is a prime example. New plastic backing means carpets that “you can clean with a wet vac and that aren’t going to foster bacterial infections,” Davignon said, adding “it softens the look and feel.”
At an out-patient cancer clinic at Providence’s Women & Infants Hospital, Vision III covered exam room floors with a wood veneer bonded in vinyl for a welcoming look that is easy to maintain, Davignon said.
Davignon doesn’t imagine computers will replace the age-old file folder to which doctors routinely refer. But he does see them influencing office design. At several Women & Infants out-patient clinics, patients can use computers to play CD-ROMs or log onto the Internet for more information about disease, he said.
Davignon envisions a day when computers along with cabinets and countertops will be an integral part of the exam room, too. “I don’t know for what purposes they’ll be used,” he said. “But that’s going to impact the design.”
When it comes to the practice of law, computers rather than mass psychology are the driving force behind design changes, according to architect Jay Litman, associate director of architecture for Keyes Associates, LLP in Providence.
“In one sense, computers have made the individual self-sufficient. All letters and files are accessible at the click of a mouse. Appointments, contacts, even phone calls can be managed from an individual’s workstation,” Litman said. “At the same time, Internal and intra-office networks have allowed more collaboration between groups and teams, sometimes across the country.”
At the Weybosset Street offices of Wistow & Barylick in Providence, computers lawyers use to tap into a growing number of on-line legal resources have all but replaced the traditional law library, Litman said.
“The law library has been shrinking for the past decade to the point where it is now purely a symbolic item within the office,” Litman said. “The core of a modern law library was the computer work station. Now even this has been relocated to the office computer.”
“In a conceptual sense, the private office is no longer an inner sanctum but a terminal, a window to a global network,” Litman said. “The office desk is quickly becoming an ergonomic cockpit where both meetings and in depth research can be conducted. Within the span of fifteen minutes, appointments can be checked, court calendars can be verified on-line, a letter can be edited and e-mail can be sent both within the office and to myriad sources, including clients and officials.”
The focus is on ergonomics, local acoustics, intimate lighting and furniture geared for computer use and one-on-one meetings, as a result, he said.
As the millennium approaches, Litman sees a trend toward satellite or home offices with administrative and word-processing staffs and possibly conference facilities.
