According to various studies about the benefits of nature on healthcare environments, natural light has been connected to:
Faster recovery
Improvement in patients’ emotional wellness, which decreases the dependency on medication
Reduction in stress levels for family members & hospital staff
Helping to take the worry out of the healing process, thus letting the patient focus on actually getting better
My senior design group has taken on a task in which we have been asked to build a survey for Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) patients in their oncology ward, where they are testing the benefits of SageGlass. SageGlass is electrochromic glass used as an alternative to blinds and other traditional methods of regulating light in a room. The glass can regulate light automatically based on outdoor conditions, or through the use of an application that allows the patient to change the opacity of the glass as desired. Based on the studies of natural light in healthcare, it has been hypothesized that by using SageGlass and providing patients with access and ability to regulate outside natural light, their hospital experiences will be positively amplified. Currently, CHOP has a traditional survey in place, but patients/families are not filling them out, thus providing the hospital no information to work with. The survey we're building will be used in both a SageGlass rooms as well as a traditional rooms with blinds. The survey will pull information and data from the patients to allow CHOP to review and compare the results. Patients range from ages 3-18, so we've designed a gamified/interactive survey rather than a traditional one, that we've hypothesized will give patients an incentive to fill out the survey as needed. This data will allow CHOP to make a data supported decision on whether or not the SageGlass is beneficial to patients, and finally, whether or not to expand its use throughout the hospital. In addition, we are working I add a control component to the survey application as well for patients in rooms with SageGlass. This will replace the current control application, which is currently outdated, unintuitive, and not user-friendly for the user group (the child patients).
-The Technologist
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