Planning and Evaluation Methodologies for Mental Healthcare Buildings

• Research type

  Research Study

• Full title

  'PEMETH':Planning and Evaluation Methodologies for Mental Healthcare Buildings

• IRAS ID

  164577

• Contact name

  Evangelia Chrysikou

• Sponsor organisation

  UCL

• Duration of Study in the UK

  2 years, 24 months, days

• Research summary

  The study of the physical environment of acute psychiatric facilities is of fundamental importance for the care and the treatment of mentally ill people. Not only it is the most useful starting point for the scientific study of environments for mentally ill people, it is also of great value for understanding and caring for mental illnesses such as psychosis. The fundamental questions addressed in this proposal are: (i) how the mechanisms of the environment influence the personal and the social milieu of the psychiatric ward, and (ii) how the environmental requirements of the mentally ill people according to their personal needs --from the basic existential to their psychosocial needs-- interact with the social context of the ward. By addressing these issues in environments for the acutely mentally ill, the researcher aims to take advantage of the scientific tools of architectural morphology and juxtapose them with a service user-focused, architectural framework for the evaluation of psychiatric environment developed for acute psychiatric environments to investigate the environment of the wards in an integrated way. The methodology involves observation of day (public) spaces of approximately three acute mental health wards in the community to identify the use of space, analysis of the architectural plans and interviews with service users and staff on issues related to their experience of space. The findings of this study could set the first design framework for a European model of mental health architecture. The research will involve interviews of healthy volunteers (staff) and NHS mental health service users, all able to give informed consent. The total duration of the project will be 24 months but the time in the facilities will be 2-5 days overall. During this time up to approximately 8 service users and 5 staff will be interviewed for 30-45 minutes each on non-sensitive opinions on space.

• REC name

  London - City & East Research Ethics Committee

• REC reference

  15/LO/1297

• Date of REC Opinion

  2 Aug 2015

• REC opinion

  Further Information Favourable Opinion