Creating a Therapeutic Environment
For a doctor or dentist, patient care should be at the center of every decision, and that means creating a therapeutic environment. Your office is more than a simple chair and routine medical equipment. It’s a place where patients can initiate the healing process.
A patient may be anxious before or during their appointment. A therapeutic environment has a calming effect, reduces stress, and makes the patient feel comfortable with your care. In order for patients to have a positive experience, make sure you consider the details behind layout and design.
A therapeutic environment:
- Promotes healing
- Supports the needs of the patient and staff
- Provides a measurable impact on patient outcomes
It’s easy to focus in on the big decisions when you are trying to create a patient-centered practice. Your philosophical approach to care, the tools, and the technology are of course important.
Below are some basic factors to consider when it comes to creating a therapeutic environment that will improve your practice’s level of care.
Creating a Therapeutic Environment
Choose the Right Colors
Your room colors and furniture should promote peace and tranquility. Various shades of blue can help you create a calming effect. White walls offer a neutral feel and leave room for some paintings or a bolder color statement with furniture. Pediatricians can use more color in their waiting room, since they are designing with kids in mind.
While the impact of your color choices may not seem overtly important, it can have a lasting subliminal impact on the patient’s frame of mind and overall experience.
Reduce Environmental Stressors
A practice’s waiting room should always be clean and uncluttered. You can offer your patients a variety of reading materials to make their wait more convenient but keep them organized and presentable. It also helps to make sure they aren’t too dated.
If you have a children’s waiting area, make sure that the books and toys are routinely picked up and put away.
Make sure that furniture is routinely dusted, and floors are routinely swept and vacuumed. Other environmental stressors may include a glare from the lights or poor air quality. When these are eliminated, the patient experience can improve. These may seem like the smaller details, but they make a significant difference in patient care.
Noise Reduction
When you are designing your practice, make sure to factor in acoustics. Noise reduction plays a significant role in creating a therapeutic environment. As a patient, you wouldn’t necessarily want to hear everything occurring in the room next to you – especially if it is playing up any anxiety or fears brought on by your medical condition or the visit.
If sound is already a factor within your office, white noise machines may help. They create a stronger sense of calm amongst your patients, and they can show that you value patient privacy.
Exposure to Nature
Whenever possible you can design your office with a view of nature. Interior or exterior gardens, aquariums and artwork with a natural theme all offer a soothing feel.
Conclusion
Your practice’s reputation and brand are built on creating a positive patient experience. Creating a therapeutic environment plays a significant role. This type of soothing environment can have a positive impact on your staff as well – improving the level of patient care.
If you have any questions or would like to talk about what this means for your practice, contact us today!
What Your Dentist Waiting Room Says About Your Practice
Many patients are anxious leading up to a dental procedure. It stands to reason that your dentist waiting room should be a place where patients can rest and alleviate some of that anxiety before they enter the treatment area.
The waiting room showcases how well you pay attention to detail – and how much you value the entire patient experience. The smallest accommodations make a significant difference. You can use your office’s waiting room to strengthen your patient relationships.
5 Opportunities to Create a Dentist Waiting Room that Conveys the Right Message
Appropriate Wait Times – Your patients value their time. Long waits can lead to poor word of mouth, which can have a damaging impact to your practice in the age of Yelp, Google, and other review sites. Keeping your patients waiting for long amounts of time can negatively impact the relationship before the work even starts.
Even the patients who didn’t have any form of anxiety about their procedure may become a little nervous if given too much time to think about it beforehand.
Wall Art – Artwork is an excellent way to create a soothing environment that can take patients’ minds off their visit. There is more that can be done to take advantage of this space. Your walls can be used to help build trust, and a personal connection with your patients before they set foot into the treatment areas.
You could create a “patient of the month” board. You can use before and after smile photos and talk about the work that was done. You could display photos of your office staff in their personal hobbies. These photos may serve as an excellent conversation starter as the next patient makes their way into the treatment area.
Appropriate TV or Music – If your office specializes in children’s care, a Disney movie or age-appropriate cartoon can help calm kids before their appointment begins. If your office is focused more on adult care, it can help to have a handful of well-known movie staples on repeat.
When a patient mentally connects your office with one of their favorite movies, you win. The same thing goes for music. While elevator music may have a calming effect, a selection of oldies, classic rock, or well-known blues songs may send them out the door humming a song that they love.
Indulgences – A mini fridge stocked with water can make the wait a little more bearable. Coffee, juices, and other drinks also add an excellent touch. What about adding a super-comfortable arm chair, or even a massage chair? Those are the details people will remember upon leaving.
Interior Design – Make sure that the design details contribute to a soothing environment. Every detail involving the wall color, furniture, and artwork should contribute to a professional, relaxing environment.
For instance, blues can have a tranquil, peaceful feel. The couches, chairs, throw pillows, and wall art all offer opportunity for accent color.
Conclusion
You work hard to attract new patients and keep them happy with the experience. Make sure that your dentist waiting room isn’t killing that experience before they ever make it back to the treatment area.
Feng Shui for Great Interior Design in Your Doctor’s Office
At Apex Design Build, we draw on decades of architectural design and construction experience, working to deliver on your exact specifications. If you’re looking for an expert partner and advisor, we can help. We care about innovation, design, and we always strive to excel. Should you want us to, we can take the lead on the project or work with you to meet your needs.
Our years of practice mean we can offer sound advice on all manner of construction and design elements. You deserve a doctor’s office or dental clinic that will attract patients but also motivate your staff. Efficiency and productivity are core driving factors in our work. We specialize in design and construction services, but we can also offer interior design services, floor planning services, and more. Doctor Office Interior Design is important, much like dental clinic floor planning. But what are the key factors that determine great doctor’s office interior design? Here we examine the answers in detail for your benefit.
Feng Shui Principles
Using Feng Shui, you can identify stress points in your workplace and neutralize them to increase productivity. Doctor’s office interior design and dental clinic floor plan both rely on ergonomic and efficient use of space. If you don’t make the best use of your environment, this can lead to a lack of flow in the workplace. This will also have a negative effect on productivity, rendering your staff less efficient, which is bound to affect patient satisfaction.
Placement of Furniture
Also, think about where you place your furniture. In waiting rooms, for example, instead of having seating in the middle of the floor, where it could lead to traffic jams, place it along walls. This will improve the flow of the room and put patients at ease. It is a natural instinct to want your back to a wall, representing safety and will contribute to a calm atmosphere. Furniture is a big part of interior design, which you should always pay appropriate attention.
Lighting
Additionally, you should also avoid having too many bright lights that will dazzle your patients. This can also contribute to feelings of drowsiness, especially for staff who are working there all day. We recommend investing in layered lighting, or even a dimmer switch. Then you can adjust your lighting to suit the time of day. This will allow patients and staff to make a stress-free transition from your waiting room to your exam room. And from there to the treatment room, back to the reception, and outside again.
What We Can Do for You
With Apex, we can assure you that we will exceed your expectations. Should you need a dermatology or ophthalmology office, veterinary or plastic surgery clinic, we can help. Additionally, we also build custom cabinetry and millwork on request, to fit the contours and requirements of your workspace. We’ve already satisfied hundreds of clients and hope to serve many more. You can be one of many satisfied clients. All you have to do is call.
Expert Ideas for Dental Treatment Room Design
At Apex Design Build, our decades of experience give us an added edge over our competitors. This also means we have more to offer you, our clients. We want to know: What makes you tick? How do you want your dental office design to look? What features should it have? In our experience, excellent dental clinic design relies on a collaborative relationship with clients. The more we understand your needs, the better equipped we are to meet them.
Whether you want to build your new dental clinic from the ground up, or you’re renovating existing premises, Apex can help. You may even wish to expand your practice footprint to attract new clientele or build a new dental office practice design altogether. We know that an optimal setup for dental treatment is critical to great design. Each of your operatory rooms should be fit for purpose, incorporating innovative architecture and essential equipment. In this article, we give some expert advice on dental treatment room design.
Equipment and Furniture for Dental Treatment Rooms
Equipment should provide comfort for your patients while promoting ergonomics for your staff. It’s also important to know that each piece of equipment or furniture should mesh together like individual puzzle pieces. If one piece isn’t right, the whole picture will look odd. Appearances aren’t everything, but they go a long way to satisfying patients. Apex has extensive experience building custom-tailored furniture for operatory rooms. As such, we can work to any specification. If you want to select your chair and then work outwards, we can help you design your floor plan. Or if you prefer to design space-saving storage solutions first and work inward, then we can adjust our methods to suit you. But what other features do you find in an operatory room?
1- Dental Patient Chair. The most recognizable aspect of any dental treatment room, your dental patient chair is the center of the room. We recommend starting with the chair and building around it, as everything else flows naturally from there. It should be comfortable and functional, while not overly large. There is a wide range of sizes available if you have a smaller operatory.
2- Suitable Seating for Your Clinicians. Your staff work hard, often going the extra mile for patients and the practice. As such, you should ensure they have somewhere to sit down. It’s essential to create an operatory room that is comfortable for staff as well as patients.
3- Dental Delivery System. This is your central hub, from which you control your other treatment systems. Typically, this will be integrated into the architecture of the room, like the chair, as a static feature. This may be separate from or part of your computer system.
4- Surgical Lighting. The right lighting is essential to dentistry, and your operatory room requires professional surgical lighting for your work.
5- Storage Solutions and Architecture. Maximizing space is essential for your dental treatment room due to constant foot traffic. At Apex, we always keep ease of access in mind, for staff and patients. Spaces should be designed to flow naturally, directing patients and staff to the right place. It should allow easy access in and out, guiding them to and from the exit. We can design bespoke overhead storage as well as floor-level cabinets for you. All you have to do is ask.
For us, the ideal dental office is one that serves everyone’s needs, providing a therapeutic atmosphere for dental treatment. We want to understand your ideal modern dental clinic design techniques. Not only that, we want to help design it, and build it for you. Don’t waste time. Get in touch.
