Exploring Hospital Wayfinding Systems: Touchscreen Kiosks, Apps and Environmental Cues

Abstract

This research examined the usability and effectiveness of wayfinding in multiple large, complex, multi-building hospitals. The initial research explored three large hospitals’ touchscreen wayfinding interfaces. Errors and issues consistently observed were organized and developed into heuristics and design recommendations. In phase two, a promising mobile application was chosen and both a heuristic analysis and an onsite test of effectiveness were conducted by four researchers. Though the application met many requirements and solved many issues from phase one, it did not meet the expectation of real time navigation. For phase three we chose an app that provided real time navigation and conducted a usability test onsite. Results indicate that this problem is multi-faceted and wayfinding solutions must consider the other available aids in the environment. Incorporation of user centered design principles and requiring the evaluations of users in the development of wayfinding aids are needed. Beyond usability, the key learning is that the wayfinding systems cannot be created in a vacuum, rather the interfaces, the placement of the wayfinding system and the environment of the hospital must be considered. The wayfinding kiosk or app information should complement the environmental information such as color coding, landmarks, room and elevator labeling and signage.

Research on Evaluation Method of Wayfinding Signs in Medical Institutions Based on Mobile Network Intelligent Navigation

“…e optimization objective function adopted by the k-means clustering algorithm is shown in formula (3). Density-based method: a fundamental difference between the density-based method and the other methods is that it is not based on various distances, but based on density.…”

“…People usually need to nd the target location accurately and e ciently during medical treatment. However, preliminary studies have shown that even though most large hospitals have indoor recognition systems, many people still spend unnecessary time looking for directions during treatment [3,4].…”

Wayfinding in hospital landscape: syntactical analysis of planting design in hospitals in Kerman, Iran

“…The wayfinding applications and the touchscreen navigation kiosks have not been able to solve the wayfinding problems alone, as they have not been designed based on the real space of the hospitals. Beside them, the colours, labels, landmarks and signs must be used for wayfinding (Harper et al , 2019). The post-occupancy evaluation must be done regularly, and it would greatly help with revision of the hospital design elements such as the wayfinding (Rodrigues et al , 2019).…”