Services
Positioning, Experience Strategy, Concept & Design Guidelines
Hospital for the Future
San Francisco, CA
Innovating the Future of Healthcare.
The Brief
In 2018, UCSF Health—one of the premier health systems in the nation—received a $500M commitment from Helen Diller Foundation for a new hospital to anchor their historic Parnassus Heights campus. The goal was to help meet increasing demand while finding opportunities to integrate the lush natural beauty of the surrounding Mount Sutro Open Space Reserve. The new hospital would focus on enhancing the family and patient experience, as well as provide much-needed space, technology and staff and provider facilities. With their sights set high, UCSF needed help envisioning what the future of a hospital like this might actually look like. Rather than constraining themselves to what they knew, UCSF sought to push beyond the boundaries of present day, and engaged Brand Bureau to help create a vision for the Hospital for the Future.
The Approach
In a hospital, design can have a profound impact on the mental and physical wellbeing of all those who enter, and poor design can have real physiological and financial costs. Beyond patients, hospitals rarely facilitate healthy lifestyles for their staff and providers, or encourage wellness to the communities beyond their walls. The new hospital at UCSF Parnassus Heights will change that. With flexible spaces infused with nature, well-appointed rooms that accommodate family and inspire healing, and meaningful amenities and events for the community, the hospital of the future will be a Healing Habitat, a holistic experience and environment that fosters wellness for all.
Working closely with UCSF Health over months of research, trend analysis, focus groups and interviews, we developed a 100+ page concept book. Our iterative process culminated in a creative roadmap for the hospital of the future.
1. Research & Goal Setting
We immersed ourselves in the world of healthcare and got smart on the unique conditions of UCSF’s Parnassus Heights campus.
Understanding the importance and potential impact of this project, we began our process with a comprehensive research and immersion phase. During this time we engaged in field research and landscape analysis, surveyed patients and held workshops with experts to help us truly understand pain points and opportunities.
“The Hospital of the Future must be a new kind of hospital. A more human experience. A natural environment. It’s a place that invites people in—patients, providers, and learners—and reflects the culture and diversity of its community.”
2. Future-Proofing
We developed a trendscape, using our newly-fortified understanding of the landscape today as a platform for forecasting into the future.
This process built upon past and present healthcare trends with ideas that helped push the boundaries of what a hospital experience could be like. The goal was to reach beyond our current understanding of the industry to plan for 2030 taking into account the project’s long lead time and lofty goals.
3. Experience Mapping
We created user archetypes and built out an experience framework to help us anticipate future behavior patterns and consider the holistic need’s of a hospital’s highly diverse community.
4. Concept
We developed a concept narrative that set the tone for our work to come and created a sturdy foundation for future ideation. This concept was built upon five experience pillars:
Human Connection
Something about how the process began by listening
Active Healing
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Organic Design
Something about how the process began by listening
Responsive Systems
Something about how the process began by listening
Urban Culture
Something about how the process began by listening
5. Visioning
We envisioned a healing habitat, a place that fosters wellness for all—physically and emotionally—within and beyond its walls.
With all of the foundational work set, we created a dynamic world for the hospital of the future and developed signature experiences for all aspects of the user journey, working with an illustrator to help us visualize these experiences while leaving room for imagination.
