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Page 18 — Health Care Properties Quarterly — January 2017
We were greeted by the director of
nursing, who described my “symp-
toms” to me and ushered me into my
wheelchair. Immediately, I became
keenly aware of people and the build-
ing from a very different viewpoint –
sitting in a wheelchair.
I was guided to my new home and
given a walker to assist in standing for
my initial weigh-in before having my
vitals documented.
During my initial intake, I met with
the lifestyle coordinator, who asked
me a series of questions, including
what I like to eat, hobbies and how
I like to begin my day. This all began
to stir my emotions, and I realized I
could no longer do what I like to do
on my own. I’m no longer in control of
my own independence in a meaning-
ful way, and they will do the best they
can for me with the resources avail-
able to the community.
After getting settled, I was scheduled
for “therapy” in the afternoon, but did
not actually receive treatment as the
staff was occupied with residents of
the community. I had a significant
amount of downtime throughout the
afternoon to experience other areas
of the building in my wheelchair. I
realized that a resident of the skilled
nursing wing is not able to access the
exterior without an escort due to the
terrain. I was able to get around the
building, but I had dementia so it had
to be with my escort. I found several
barriers that were code compliant but
a bit difficult to overcome for even
an able-bodied person and wondered
what a frail resident does in these cir-
cumstances.
About an hour prior to dinner, resi-
dents were gathered in the dining area
waiting to eat. The dining room was
originally designed for 60 percent of
the residents but they were all there
and left no room for me. Instead, I
went to the independent living dining
room and enjoyed a wonderful meal.
There, I was able to speak with sev-
eral independent living residents and
learned quite a bit about the indepen-
dent unit designs.
By 9 p.m., I was seated alone in
the lounge trying to work the mul-
tiple remote controls for the TV. As
I was unable to work any of the five
remotes, I watched what was on aim-
lessly, and became increasingly lonely
and reflective.
From the initial feeling of nervous
anticipation and mixture of emotions
to the constant learning moments
throughout the day, my stay provided
immeasurable opportunities for posi-
tive change in my work as an archi-
tect. The following are the key points
of interest frommy experience.
Top 10 takeaways
1) More natural light (skylights or
solar tubes in central areas) and addi-
tional attention to artificial lighting.
2) Larger bathrooms in the units:
• Improved shower accessibility;
• Grab bar locations in shower/tub
rooms;
• Showers in all resident rooms; and
• Deeper leg room under the vanities
and move the lavatory closer to the
edge.
3) More room to maneuver in the
units and higher toe kick space at
bathroom casework.
4) Storage, storage, storage – with
deeper alcoves to store equipment in
the corridors.
5) Improved access and access con-
trol between building areas for resi-
dents and staff.
6) Enhanced wayfinding throughout
the community.
7) Increased and improved access to
outdoors, including a secure courtyard.
8) Increased awareness of sharp cor-
ners at handrails.
9) Better quality transition strips and
carpet selection.
10) Gathering spaces and engage-
ment areas:
• Large, flexible, multipurpose com-
munity space(s) for residents to gather
and interact;
• Staggered dining or two to three
spaces that double as dining and gath-
ering areas; and
• Space for staff to meet, especially
during shift changes.
My “day in the life” experience was
enlightening, eye-opening, emotional,
humbling and gratifying. It showed
me that an amazing staff of caregivers
and an exceptional operator can make
any building work for the residents’
well-being and comfort. At the same
time, my experience emphasized the
incredible importance of creating a
setting that responds to the needs of
staff and residents. My responsibil-
ity as an architect is to work with the
developer and/or operator team to find
design solutions that make the staff’s
job easier and create an environment
of comfort, access and engagement for
all residents. The lessons learned and
key takeaways undoubtedly will come
in to play and help inform the design
of future senior living projects.s
Undercover
The time to capitalize on this
facility improvement is now. Large
rebates from utility companies can
cover more than half of your turnkey
project cost. And these cash benefits
are not guaranteed to last. They will
most likely decrease every year, and
can stop all together if the program
is stopped. The EPAct that allows for
the total cost to be written off as an
accelerated depreciation based on
square footage is also not guaranteed
to last. It will need to be extended
again in 2018 to make this special tax
allocation available to those who use
energy-efficient design like incorpo-
rating LED. These incentives are likely
to go away while LED will become the
standard lighting choice. So at some
point this transition will need to hap-
pen.
Be the one who sees the light and
makes the recommendation to make
the change to LED at your facil-
ity. Make the transition and have a
financial incentive to do so, or wait,
and have to pay for it on your own.
The changing of the guard inWash-
ington, D.C., is also adding to the
uncertainty of what will happen with
government’s mandate to provide this
kind of incentive to help consumers,
property owners and tenants make
these transitions. And there will likely
be added penalties for not reaching
energy standards in your facility. This
is becoming the case in Boulder. The
exterior parking lot lighting through-
out the city will need to be LED by
July to meet the city’s forward-think-
ing standard. Similar standards are
being set in Florida and around the
can expect a heavy push
to adopting LED while also seeing the
incentives of utility rebates and tax
deductions go away.s
Littell