The whole-life benefits of digitisation in healthcare construction

Our healthcare team discusses how digital technology can help construction companies become more efficient and more collaborative to better deliver healthcare projects.

The use of digital technology has grown exponentially in the construction industry in recent years. Tools such as virtual and augmented reality are becoming increasingly mainstream and should help construction companies become more efficient and allow greater collaboration with the customers they deliver projects for.

Over the last two years, Tilbury Douglas has invested more than £5m in technology security and digital processes to allow us to become a leading construction innovator. We were the first to deliver a Level 2 BIM project and achieve ISO 19650. We have also received awards for Construction Excellence ‘Innovation’ in 2019 and 2021.

At IHEEM 2022, we launched the Tilbury Douglas Connect Configurator, which marks the next major milestone on this journey. The Connect Configurator provides a web-based application for smarter and more efficient creation of concept designs using approved standardised layouts. The flexible platform can design whole buildings, by placing individual rooms which include building components.

Using prefabricated models and the latest 3D technology, Connect Configurator allows for more detail and information to be created earlier in the project. This gives Tilbury Douglas’ clients data at their fingertips, so they can make informed data driven decisions, including live cost, carbon and time estimates.

At an early design stage, more detailed digital design information can now be accessed via a simple web portal enabling fast visualisation and cost planning, leading to quicker identification of the optimum solution, with our clients. This means better client business case development, as this digitisation now offers equivalent RIBA stage four information at SOC/OBC with the Stage two design process potentially halved.

During construction, digitisation is helping with risk identification, supplier coordination, defect avoidance and progress reporting in real-time. For example, a live 360 visual recording of site progress via portable cameras can passively capture and share live data without disrupting workflow. This offers instant virtual oversight and capture of up-to-date as-built conditions at every stage of construction.

These new and innovative digital tools not only benefit the design and construction stages of a project to get it right first time, but also offer significant operational benefit for estates teams. The use of 3D digital surveys and asset mapping provides detailed asset retrieval for maintenance and fault finding without invasive investigation. This is so important in the healthcare environment to avoid disruption. Furthermore, we can interrogate the building’s digital twin to optimise building operational performance in terms of energy and carbon, as well as hard and soft maintenance.

Another significant benefit of digitisation is to support improved clinical efficiency and effectiveness. The construction industry is uniquely placed to support Trusts in understanding both the ‘what is possible’, as well as the ‘how it can be optimally delivered”.

However, it is important that digitisation is seen as an enabler for the design and delivery around functionality, need, and future aspirations, with its early inception in a project being essential to ensure a clear understanding of the clinical aspects of healthcare delivery and clinical excellence, for the project.

We use an experienced clinical planner to help the client work up the optimum clinical model and establish the required functionality. The client does not know what they do not know, and so we can take them on an “art of the possible” journey with the starting point being the clinical model. Importantly, we share leading edge solutions and global delivery experience to help the client develop a digital strategy that enhances their primary functions as a healthcare provider.

Our team’s ethos is to design facilities that support clinical excellence, facilitate delivery of safe effective care, and maximise the patient and staff experience.  Our three fundamental tenets are to develop:

• a clinical model fit for today’s needs and forward thinking to embrace the vision of tomorrow
• patient-centred designs that embrace the diverse needs of carers, staff and support workers
• adaptable and flexible facilities to manage demographic growth and agile to accommodate clinical advancement, future innovation, and emerging digital technologies.

The earlier we are involved in a project, the more we can work in true partnership with the client, bringing our knowledge and experience from the start to support them in thinking through their aspirations and designing the clinical models of the future.

We can advise on what is available now and how it works, as well as helping them to horizon gaze so that the right decisions are made early in the project.  We work with the clinical teams as closely as we work with the estates and facilities teams to make sure the solutions are joined up and deliver operational excellence for everybody.

Our team brings a wealth of experience in development of smart hospitals that we can integrate seamlessly into our client’s plans to provide leading edge, digital enabled and futureproof designs bringing benefit at both a building and estates level, as well as most importantly, at the clinical interface.

Digitally enabled, smart hospitals improve patient, visitor and staff experience, reduce patient anxiety, save time and money, reduce environmental impact and better support clinical delivery by, for example:

• digital wayfinding and location service information tailored to individual needs and requirements
• digital check-in from apps, a patient portal, or website that keeps the patient informed and enables them to manage their waiting time and helps preclude crowded clinical and waiting areas
• real time location services (RTLS) to locate equipment and personnel in the most time efficient way and reduce time wasted looking for equipment and searching for key staff
• a nurse call system that enables nurses to speak directly with patients saving up to two hours of clinical time per nurse per shift that can be used to provide direct clinical care to patients
• patient journey boards that integrate with the Electronic Medical Records (EMR) and other scheduling systems to facilitate care coordination and enable clinical teams to see exactly where a patient is on their care journey.

It is increasingly clear that if the myriad of available technology is embraced by the industry throughout the whole life of a project, then we can help ourselves and our clients be more efficient and effective to ultimately deliver better healthcare outcomes.