Healthcare spaces easily become saturated with “stuff: halls crowded with stretchers and wheelchairs; walls covered in handrails, bumper rails, signs, posters, and hand sanitizer dispensers; and desks stacked with files, computers, monitors, and pagers. All of this “stuff” can create a feeling of chaos. Any sense of order may be lost. As such, healthcare spaces can overwhelm anyone—patient, family, or staff.

In design solutions, we may have a tendency to add stuff like more finishes, more details, and more graphics, in order to solve the problem. As designers, we may be complicating the space by continually adding to the space.

Instead, attempt the opposite: subtract and eliminate all of the unnecessary stuff in the space. What if all of the stuff had a place and was well organized? What if there was an inherent order?