Work to Start on Prince & Princess of Wales Hospice in Glasgow
Work will shortly commence on a scheme to deliver the new Prince & Princess of Wales Hospice within Glasgow’s Bellahouston Park, amidst high hopes that the site will revolutionise palliative care throughout the city and beyond.
The facility is built to offer patients the most advanced techniques in hospice, palliative and end of life care, and employs the Sengetun care model which places the needs of patients and their families first.
This approach puts emphasis on privacy and aesthetics in design to instil a positive impact on the wellbeing of patients.
Architectural Director with Ryder Architecture, Alastair Forbes, commented: “It was important for me to spend some time in an in-patient bed to understand what patient really experiences. To capture that moment, I took a photograph of what the view beyond the bed is.
“If we were to only draw a plan of that room, it’s would be all the important things that you couldn’t represent: how much the ceiling is in view, how much a patient doesn’t see out of the window, the smells, the noises, the proximity to other patients and staff.”
Forbes added that this has been a real touchstone throughout the whole process and insisted that the scheme is all about going back to that photo and constantly asking how we give a patient choice, adding: “We make buildings for people, everything is about people.”
Work on-site is expected to commence on 12 September with the first patients moving in by 2018. Earlier in the month, the hospice received a welcome £25,000 cash boost from the ScottishPower Foundation.
Last year, the foundation also gave £25,000, meaning it has doubled the amount it has now given to a total of £50,000 altogether towards the initiative.
The donation will pay for a complementary room in the new hospice, which is expected to open its doors to patients in spring 2018.
