Running Head: HEALTH CARE FACILITY PLANNING

Health Care Facility Planning

Name

Institution

Date
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Steps of facility planning

Generally, facility planning steps is both a cyclical and an end-to-end for a strategic adaptation

and continuous improvement for the management of the facility space (Garcia-Diaz and Smith,

2008). Therefore, for proper and effective facility planning, the following four elaborate steps

must be followed to the later.

Step 1: Setting up of the facility planning environment.

To start the planning process of a facility, the environment for planning should be well defined.

The planning environment is important because is useful in establishing the primary baseline for

sourcing the primary data that should be used in the overall facility planning process. The

environment for planning should contain the planning configurations and elements. Normally,

every environment for planning should be configured so that to effectively manage the planning

periods and years, contact roles, planning data, and the key contacts involved, forecasting data

and scope of planning.

Step 2: Forecasting

Immediately before carrying out the actual forecasting, forecasting survey is necessary to

facilitate and expedite the entire process of collecting the facility’s forecast data for the space.

The facility as an organization has a hierarchical structure that must be considered during the

forecasting step (Tompkins, 2010). The facility’s records for forecast survey should be created

automatically from the historic forecast survey records available within the facility. The

projected future facility’s information is usually fetched from the facility’s manager. Upon the

submission of a completed forecast survey, the information presented would then be used to
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attain an insight into the facility’s improvement changes associated with demand and supply for

space over a given time period.

Step 3: Space plan and scenario evaluation

A facility space plan offers the planners with an environment to operate with the set planning

data such as the supply and demand volume data for a given set of the facility locations. The

space plan is usually created with a portfolio sub-plan or plan which would have many space

plans as possible. On the other hand, the space scenarios are the alternative solutions proposed

which includes feasibility and what-if option studies under space plan consideration. The

primary space plan contains the general summery data of the plan, planning scope, common set

up data, data aggression and goals and targets comparisons. The evaluation step is usually

applied in the iterative in-process or final evaluation review step so as to help determine and

approve the right implementation scenario.

Step 4: Implementation and feedback follow-up

The is usually done with immediate effect after the completion of the evaluation phase whereby

a random scenario is selected, then reviewed and assessed for approval, and finally the actual

facility space plan is forwarded for approval. Any additional and important feedback and

follow-up activity necessary in implementing the approved facility space plan should be handled

by the same implementation group using the allocated resource for implementation.

The importance of pre-design planning

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Pre-design facility planning usually takes place after the funding of the facility has been

confirmed available shortly before the commencement of the design of the facility (Garcia-Diaz

and Smith, 2008). Therefore, the entire pre-design phase is considered important due to the

following reasons;

i. The design phase provides room for the studies aimed at analyzing the issues dealing

with the facility space requirements. The study will determine through thorough

assessment the land and other spaces resources necessary for the establishment of a

health care facility with an environment that would comfortably accommodate and favor

both the practitioners and the clients.

ii. Through the pre-design planning, the facility planners are also able to evaluate and

analyze the available opportunities and constraint challenges associated with the

proposed facility site. Moreover, the planners are expected to consider comparing the

budget and the cost of the facility in plan.

iii. In addition, the pre-design phase of the planning allows the planners of the health facility

to determine the facility financial feasibility, launch intensive and objective financial

campaigns, establishment and the development of the facility planning project team. This

would help the planning team to commence and complete the facility planning project

without any difficulty which would otherwise lead to failures.

iv. Lastly, the pre-design phase of facility planning provides for the engagement and

collaboration of the community in the actual planning process of the facility. The

planners must seek out how to work in accord with leaders in the neighborhood of the

facility setting so as to achieve effective control of the site and acquisition of the

facility’s properties. The phase is always known for refining of the facility budget.
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Rationale (or decision process) when determining whether to renovate or replace a health

care facility.

Normally, deciding whether to replace or renovate a health care facility is one of the activities

the facilities’ planners are faced with (Harper, 2009). Therefore, it is of great importance for one

to understand and internalize the rationale behind taking the decision process which is as

follows;

To determine the cost effective option

It is always important for the facility planning team to understand the aspect of cost essentials

and determine the effective budget cost in developing either of the two facility plans. The

process involves cost comparison of the renovation and replacement of the health care facility.

This costs are classifies as under old verses new design costs, moving verses maintenance cost,

construction verses furnishing cost and so on.

i. To determine the options’ flexibility

Flexibility determination is also another key rationale behind whether to replace or renovation

decision process. This concerns with the near and long term future expansion requirements of the

health care facility. For instance, when the current location of the facility would effectively favor

the expansion of the facility, then the planning team would rather prefer the renovation to

replacement of the health care facility.

ii. Determination of the location suitability

If the health facility is already situated on a highly desirable and suitable location, then the

planning team would possibly consider renovating the existing facility rather than constructing a
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the new facility elsewhere. The location of a health facility should therefore be located such that

clients access the care services with ease.

Therefore, making the decision whether to renovate or replace a health care facility is as well a

complete process with the following key steps;

Step 1: Gathering of assumption in considering whether either the replacement or the renovation

is suitable

Starting with the assumption rather than holding meetings for setting goals of either of the option

in the meeting of the stakeholders’ goals through the testing of the assumptions. Moreover, at the

end, assumptions should be challenging and tricky so as to assist with creativity in solving the

decision problems. This would possible yields the solutions which are important in weighing the

options to either replace or renovate the existing health care facility.

Step 2: Definition based on the clarity of purpose.

This is the second and the last step in the decision process. Such project planning activities

usually have specific desirable outcome rather than just clichés (Harper, 2009). When the goals

of designing the project are clearly defined, the project will be proper and tightly tied to the

pathway of the health care facility operation. Therefore, the step will provides the planners with

hints and the useful idea to give answer to the rising decision questions and how to best prioritize

the two options.

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References

Garcia-Diaz, A., & Smith, J. M. G. (2008). Facilities planning and design. Upper Saddle River,

NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.

Harper, J. (2009). Planning for recreation and parks facilities: Predesign process, principles,

and strategies. State College, Pa: Venture Publishing, Inc.

Jacobs, M. (2004). Graphic design concepts: The desktop publisher's guide to designing business

documents, forms, and web sites. North Olmsted, OH: Words & Pictures Publishing.

Tompkins, J. A. (2010). Facilities planning. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.