Ronald L. Skaggs, FAIA
Chairman and CEO, HKS Inc., Dallas, Texas

Joseph G. Sprague, FAIA
Director of Health Facilities, HKS Inc., Dallas, Texas

George J. Mann, AIA
Professor, College of Architecture, Texas A & M, College Station, Texas

When Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, his vision was that one of the devices be in every city in a not-too-distant future. Is our current notion of health networks and facilities of the future really sufficiently bold and visionary?

The opportunities, changes, and challenges of the future are uncertain. However, existing trends in the health care industry can offer insight into how architectural and related firms will approach the design of health facilities during the next century.

The client for firms will evolve from individual and isolated health facilities to a health care network. Accordingly, architectural firms will be compelled to develop new skills, services, emphases, and organizational structures to respond to the rapidly changing needs and demands of this new client. It is our hope to present a visionary view of the possibilities of this health care network of the future. Networks have great potential for positively and economically impacting health care of the populations served.

Beyond the Hospital Model
The hospital has evolved into the core contemporary health facility, an evolution so pervasive that the very term hospital is rapidly becoming obsolete, much as earlier terms, such as almshouse, pest house, sick house, and lunatic asylum became antiquated. Health care is continually evolving, and architecture for health must adapt to the new environment and demands this brings.

The increasing demand for lower cost health services has forced the health system to rethink and redesign its facilities and networks to compete and survive in a managed care market. In addition, we now live in a society that emphasizes the broader, interactive scope, with global markets and global communications. These forces are shaping the health care facility of the future: the health network, for which the operating framework is managed care.

Every minute, every day, every year, the science and technology of health care is being reinvented in the United States. If a health care network is to survive, it will have to continuously reinvent itself just as quickly to keep up with changes in the industry. Health care networks must be more responsive to changing circumstances. Therefore, it is imperative that medical providers become truly flexible.

The Tom Peters Seminar: Crazy Times Call for Crazy Organizations is a book authorized by a leader in organizational management. In the view of Peters and many others, health care is a crazy field. If health care networks are going to survive, they will have to adopt unorthodox techniques.

Abstract

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