The purpose of this project is to elucidate the effects of the built environment on pediatric oncology patients, their parents, and staff, with the general hypothesis that increased satisfaction with the built environment will be associated with better physical and emotional functioning and healthcare/workplace satisfaction. The built environment will be evaluated subjectively, through satisfaction questionnaires given to patients, parents, and staff, as well as objectively through the recording of specific target environmental features. For patients (5-18), relationships will be examined between objective environmental features, satisfaction with the built environment, self-reported and parent-proxy reports of their physical and emotional functioning, parent self-report of physical and emotional functioning, parent satisfaction with the built environment, and parent satisfaction with the healthcare provided to their child. Additionally, we expect that Latino families' satisfaction with the built environment and health functioning will be more strongly associated with features of the built environment that promote visiting and socializing than for their Anglo counterparts. For staff, the same relationships will be examined, but with measures of job satisfaction replacing healthcare satisfaction.
| Sherman-Bien, Sandra A; Malcarne, Vanessa L; Roesch, Scott et al. (2011) Quantifying the relationship among hospital design, satisfaction, and psychosocial functioning in a pediatric hematology-oncology inpatient unit. HERD 4:34-59 |
