Lad, Hina Ramanbhai;
(2019)
Surgical environments and medical technologies.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
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PhD Thesis_ Surgical Environments and Medical Technologies-Lad 2019.pdf - Submitted Version Access restricted to UCL open access staff until 2 April 2026. Download (173MB) |
Abstract
This thesis investigates the spatial design of surgical operating rooms in UK NHS hospitals. Over the last 50 years, developments in surgery, radiology and medical technology have progressed at a rapid pace, leading to techniques such as minimally invasive laparoscopic surgery, interventional radiology, and robotic-assisted surgery. With this growth in knowledge, surgical specialisation has also increased. Yet the basic layout of the operating suite in the UK remains as documented in the 1960s’ HBN guidance. My research investigates past and current UK guidance on the design and planning of operating suites, through a series of observational studies, activity mappings, hospital surveys, speculative design proposals and two detailed case studies of specialist surgery: fetal intervention and orthopaedic surgery. I put forward the argument that ‘one size does not fit all’ for current and future surgical services and that specialisation in surgery should lead the design philosophy for operating spaces in the future. The key findings from my research are: a) recently built UK hospitals have moved towards dedicating operating suites to particular surgical service specialisms, such as orthopaedics, maternity and urology; b) general surgery, emergency surgery, trauma surgery and day surgery could be categorised as specialist surgery, with individual tailor-made environments to meet their specific needs; c) there are three different spatial configurations for each surgical case – before surgery, during surgery and after surgery; d) while the before and after phases of a surgical case are similar in the majority of procedures, it is ‘during surgery’ that the greatest difference in use of equipment, number of staff, layout of the room and activities vary and e) current UK guidance does not account for different surgical specialisms. I propose that a range of operating sizes, fit-outs and suite configurations are required to meet current and future needs.
| Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Qualification: | Ph.D |
| Title: | Surgical environments and medical technologies |
| Event: | UCL (University College London) |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2019. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of the Built Environment > The Bartlett School of Architecture |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10069783 |
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