NUS launches reference book for future nursing home designs

SINGAPORE — When Ms Sarah Ng Ai Lian visited a nursing home as a third-year architecture undergraduate student, she was struck by how very “insular” the home was. Residents there stayed within the compound and were “shielded” from the public, said Ms Ng. Seeing that, Ms Ng, who recently graduated with a Masters in Architecture from National University of Singapore (NUS) decided that she would design a home that was more open and “less enclosed”.

Ms Ng’s ideal nursing home design included urban trees that towered over an existing public park and incorporated public decks to allow residents to interact with the nearby community. Open corridors along the home offered unrestricted views of the gardens — all part of solutions that Ms Ng designed to help foster greater “community engagement”.

And while she maintained creativity in her designs, the young architect also kept intact practical considerations for the elderly, such as universal designs to help make the home more accessible for the elderly and disabled, things like elevators and ramps.

Ms Ng’s Urban Grove design concept was one of 58 that were published in a design sourcebook launched today (Oct 29) by the Department of Architecture at NUS’s School of Design and Environment (SDE).

Titled “Re-imagining the Nursing Home in Singapore”, the book is intended to be a reference for architects in Singapore who are looking to design future nursing homes. It is also the culmination of a design research project — which began in January 2012 with the support of the Ministry of Health — that involved 131 architecture students. The book also includes eight case studies of local nursing homes and design templates for eldercare facilities.

Associate Professor Wong Yunn Chii, Head of the NUS Department of Architecture said: “The Nursing Home programme is part of the department’s ongoing efforts to inculcate in our architecture students an awareness of potential and real issues faced by our elderly population.”

As a result of the programme’s research, the students discovered a key problem — existing nursing homes were located far away from housing estates, which led to a disconnect with residential communities. The students also noticed that wheelchairs were often cluttered along the corridors in the homes and that rooms had been designed to look like hospital wards, lacking a “homely” feel.

At the book launch yesterday was Dr Amy Khor, Senior Minister of State for Health and Manpower, who said: “This (design sourcebook) will also contribute towards the repository of information, ideas and experiences that we are building up, that we want to share in terms of building and designing of other nursing homes.”