The importance of the physical environment to support individualised care
Book chapter, 2018

The physical environment is an important part of individualised care. Creating care environments tailored towards the individual person’s needs is essential for high-quality care and is increasingly recognised as being associated with improved health and well-being among older people. Today, care should be holistic and view the person behind the disease, taking that person’s perspective and treating the patient as a unique individual. Despite the emerging focus on individualised care approaches, the physical environment is still not considered as an integral part of care, and relatively little attention has been paid to environmental aspects. However, the physical environment has a great potential to facilitate or restrict care processes in a broad range of care settings, not least in residential care facilities for older people. The present chapter focuses on ways to support the individual in terms of the physical environment.

Care environment

Individual needs

Design

Individualised care

Health outcomes

Author

Susanna Nordin

Dalarna university

Marie Elf

Chalmers, Architecture and Civil Engineering, Building Design

Individualized Care: Theory, Measurement, Research and Practice

207-215
9783319898995 (ISBN)

Subject Categories

Health Care Service and Management, Health Policy and Services and Health Economy

Nursing

Gerontology, specialising in Medical and Health Sciences

DOI

10.1007/978-3-319-89899-5_19

More information

Latest update

3/21/2023