Digital hospitals – enabling designs that enhance patient care

This paper will explore how LTHT has defined a ‘digital hospital’ and the challenges for NHS trusts in balancing the need for efficient and purposeful clinical estate; enhanced and safe models of care; and providing innovative solutions that consider the pace of change of digital technologies.

It will provide context to the ambitions for acute specialist hospitals that serve patients locally, regionally and beyond. It will identify and address the challenges of introducing single patient bedrooms in the NHS while aligning the needs of digital, clinical and architectural designs.

The authors will demonstrate how technology can enable these ambitions and outline the work LTHT has undertaken during early design stages to embed digital operating principals into architectural and clinical designs. We’ll outline how our process of clinical and industry engagement, using the Trust’s Innovation Pop Up, has strengthened the design by focusing on future operating states. This will ensure architectural designs are aligned and staff and patients have the technology to help then deliver effective care.

The paper will outline the Trust’s approach to defining digital hospitals against the principles of:

• fabric – what technologies need to be considered in the structure and infrastructure to enable future adoption at pace;
• footprint – what helps us move care from the hospital setting; and
• flow – what technologies support the efficient flow of clinical pathways.

The paper will demonstrate that our design has been influenced by our ambitions to deliver solutions that:       

• support remote care and observation;
• enhance communication between clinicians and patients;
• support efficient flow of patient pathways; and
• utilise digital twins and real-time data on building performance to support estates and facilities management flows

Finally, we’ll discuss how the digital twin and the use of technologies, such as virtual reality and artificial intelligence, can support engagement with the design process and, ultimately, deliver the right solution for the Trust.

Our approach at LTHT will deliver digitally enabled hospitals that support colleagues to deliver world class healthcare and improve the flow of patients through our buildings.