The role of waiting area typology in limiting the spread of COVID-19: Outpatient clinics of Erbil hospitals as a case study

Abstract

In the post-healthcare context, protecting patients against pandemic diseases like COVID-19 has become designers' responsibility; the amount and effectiveness of change are unknown, particularly in terms of future design. This study explores the potential significance of waiting area typology within outpatient clinics in generating a healthy and therapeutic environment for patients and users in terms of social distancing, as well as whether there is a relationship between outpatient and the provision of social distancing. This study employed a quantitative approach based on space syntax theory, through four different syntactic maps (Isovist, Axial, Convex and Visibility Graph Analysis), to depict hospitals in Erbil city by adopting five outpatient layout typologies such as centralized and decentralized (linear, lobby, sectoral and mixed), through measuring wayfinding, accessibility, privacy, density and circulation as outpatient layout typology factors. Results identified that there is a clear effect of outpatient layout typology factors on providing social distancing especially in waiting areas, the decentralized outpatient layout represented by both sectoral and linear typologies is the most useful typology based on social distancing compared to others. Given the influential role of outpatient layout in providing a healthy and safe healing atmosphere with more social distancing for patients, research findings provide a useful resource for healthcare designers, particularly for waiting areas within outpatient clinics.

Performance-based building design: impact of emergency department layout on its functional performance efficiency - the case of Erbil hospitals

“…On a plan, an axial map is depicted by a straight line with no vision or access interruptions that shows how far a person can see or move in a given direction (Penn, 2003). The color range represents a measure of high and low values; red color suggests the most integrated and interconnected areas, while blue indicates the least integrated and isolated places (Mustafa and Ahmed, 2022). For this study, choice, mean depth and intensity were used: the choice is used to measure the time spent-Length of Stay (LOS) of users.…”

“…They serve as a benchmark for arranging architectural plans about how areas are used (Bafna, 2003). The color range shows the high and low values; red shows the most integrated and connected areas, whilst blue shows the less connected and separated areas (Mustafa and Ahmed, 2022). In this study, entropy was used as an indicator to measure the number of spaces to reach the desired area; a higher value of entropy indicates more privacy within the desired area (Alalouch and Aspinall, 2007).…”

“…The color spectrum ranges from blue (low) through green and yellow (many visible areas) to red (very high). Visual graph analysis provides the relational aspects of the visual fields collected from all of the places of a scene (Mustafa and Ahmed, 2022). For this study, visual step depth and agent analysis were used; visual step depth measures the visibility of EDs, low value of visual step depth provides higher visibility inside EDs.…”

Wykorzystanie narzędzi cyfrowych do ulepszenia procesów operacyjnych w przestrzeniach architektonicznych polikliniki szpitalnej

“…During the COVID-19 pandemic and the post-pandemic period, social distancing played a critical role in reducing the risk of disease transmission (Yuan et al, 2021). Among the challenges for the researchers was how to include social distancing in their designs and improve hospitals so they can better face epidemics like COVID-19 (Mustafa and Ahmed, 2022).…”

The Preventive Indicators for Evaluating the Design of Existing Buildings as Epidemic-Resilient Architecture: A Theoretical Framework

“…Access considerations (Abdul Nasir et al, 2021), (Cristani et al, 2020), (M. Hameed Al-Delfi and S. Salman, 2022), (Mustafa and Ahmed, 2022).…”