About the Project

The purpose of this research is to design and test a tool for engaging a wide range of stakeholders in the complex task of designing and developing healthcare gardens for multiple health needs. Healthcare gardens represent a unique green space due to their user group which is made up of those with specific health requirements, healthcare staff, or caregivers. Substantial evidence supports the benefits of nature-based interventions, such as green and blue spaces, for positive health and wellbeing. Healthcare gardens are ideally positioned to deliver these benefits due to their proximity to patients during their care journey. Designing healthcare gardens is a complex process, however, the result of a well-designed garden can support the diverse needs of patients, staff, and the surrounding community.

This research emphasises the necessity of integrating health at the core of healthcare garden design. We propose that healthcare gardens can enhance health in multiple dimensions, including: physical health (via fitness and rehabilitation facilities), cognitive and affective health (through natural environments that alleviate mental fatigue), social health (by creating shared spaces for social interactions and prescribed activities), and developing innovative healthcare products (utilising land to grow materials like flax for growing linen to make staff scrubs or edible plants  such as herbs, fruit and vegetables for patient meals). Each design element has the potential to incorporate cradle-to-cradle principles into healthcare gardens.

This study introduces a board game to engage a range of stakeholders and local communities in the design process. The game uses personas representing various health conditions, prompting players to consider the unique healthcare needs of each persona. By simulating hospital garden designs, the game fosters empathy, creativity, and collaborative problem-solving among participants. The game’s final output is a thoughtfully designed hospital garden that accommodates a wide range of health conditions.

^{* The process of creating the boardgame} 

The game is to be placed in Dundee’s V&A museum for two* months, where members of the public are invited to play the game to design their own hospital gardens. Members of the public can add to the game through creating their own personas or by adding their own game pieces that they feel might further support health and wellbeing in a hospital garden.

The board game serves as a practical design tool for planning hospital grounds, promoting a holistic approach to healthcare garden design. The game ensures that the needs of all users are considered and balanced. By integrating diverse elements such as social spaces, production areas, and therapeutic environments, the game highlights the potential of hospital gardens to enhance health and wellbeing across multiple domains. The game serves as an educational tool as it describes design requirements for various conditions. Further, it serves as a facilitation tool to encourage communities to think about the needs of others. This research contributes to the fields of design-for-health by offering a novel method to create environments that support health and wellbeing for a range of users.