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How to Write a Visit Report

Last Updated: March 30, 2024 References

This article was co-authored by Madison Boehm . Madison Boehm is a Business Advisor and the Co-Founder of Jaxson Maximus, a men’s salon and custom clothiers based in southern Florida. She specializes in business development, operations, and finance. Additionally, she has experience in the salon, clothing, and retail sectors. Madison holds a BBA in Entrepreneurship and Marketing from The University of Houston. This article has been viewed 648,566 times.

Whether you’re a student or a professional, a visit report helps you document the procedures and processes at an industrial or corporate location. These reports are fairly straightforward. Describe the site first and explain what you did while you were there. If required, reflect on what you learned during your visit. No additional research or information is needed.

Writing a Visit Report

Explain the site's purpose, operations, and what happened during the visit. Identify the site's strengths and weaknesses, along with your recommendations for improvement. Include relevant photos or diagrams to supplement your report.

Describing the Site

• Reports are usually only 2-3 pages long, but in some cases, these reports may be much longer.
• In some cases, you may be asked to give recommendations or opinions about the site. In other cases, you will be asked only to describe the site.
• Ask your boss or instructor for models of other visit reports. If you can't get a model, look up samples online.

• If you visited a factory, explain what it is producing and what equipment it uses.
• If you visited a construction site, describe what is being constructed and how far along the construction is. You should also describe the terrain of the site and the layout.
• If you’re visiting a business, describe what the business does. State which department or part of the business you visited.
• If you’re visiting a school, identify which grades they teach. Note how many students attend the school. Name the teachers whose classes you observed.

• Who did you talk to? What did they tell you?
• What did you see at the site?
• What events took place? Did you attend a seminar, Q&A session, or interview?
• Did you see any demonstrations of equipment or techniques?

• For example, at a car factory, describe whether the cars are made by robots or humans. Describe each step of the assembly line.
• If you're visiting a business, talk about different departments within the business. Describe their corporate structure and identify what programs they use to conduct their business.

Reflecting on Your Visit

• Is there something you didn’t realize before that you learned while at the site?
• Who at the site provided helpful information?
• What was your favorite part of the visit and why?

• For example, you might state that the factory uses the latest technology but point out that employees need more training to work with the new equipment.
• If there was anything important left out of the visit, state what it was. For example, maybe you were hoping to see the main factory floor or to talk to the manager.

• Tailor your recommendations to the organization or institution that owns the site. What is practical and reasonable for them to do to improve their site?
• Be specific. Don’t just say they need to improve infrastructure. State what type of equipment they need or give advice on how to improve employee morale.

Formatting Your Report

• If you are following a certain style guideline, like APA or Chicago style, make sure to format the title page according to the rules of the handbook.

• Don’t just say “the visit was interesting” or “I was bored.” Be specific when describing what you learned or saw.

Sample Visit Report

Community Q&A

You Might Also Like

• ↑ http://services.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0010/471286/Site_Reports_for_Engineers_Update_051112.pdf
• ↑ https://www.examples.com/business/visit-report.html
• ↑ https://www.thepensters.com/blog/industrial-visit-report-writing/
• ↑ https://eclass.aueb.gr/modules/document/file.php/ME342/Report%20Drafting.pdf

About This Article

To write a visit report, start by including a general introduction that tells your audience where and when you visited, who your contact was, and how you got there. Once you have the introduction written out, take 1 to 2 paragraphs to describe the purpose of the site you visited, including details like the size and layout. If you visited a business, talk about what the business does and describe any specific departments you went to. Then, summarize what happened during your visit in chronological order. Make sure to include people you met and what they told you. Toward the end of your report, reflect on your visit by identifying any strengths and weaknesses in how the site operates and provide any recommendations for improvement. For more help, including how to format your report, read on! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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Guide to Conducting Healthcare Facility Visits

by Craig Zimring, Ph.D. Georgia Institute of Technology

Published by The Center for Health Design, 1994

INTRODUCTION

A major medical center is building a new diagnostic and treatment center that will include both inpatient services and expensive high technology outpatient services The center is considering whether to provide day surgery within the diagnostic and treatment center or in a freestanding outpatient facility. They are facing a dilemma. If they locate the day surgery center separately, they can use lower-cost construction. If they combine the functions, they can use the spare capacity that will likely become available in the inpatient operating rooms. This is especially important as outpatient procedures become increasingly complex. The center wishes to evaluate sites that currently operate in fully separate facilities versus ones that provide separate outpatient and inpatient reception and recovery facilities, but share operating rooms.

A large interiors firm has been contacted to conduct a visit of several new children’s hospitals in the Northwest. Eager to get the commission from this major hospital corporation to renovate the interior of a large children’s hospital, the firm arranges visits of hospitals it has designed as well as two designed by other firms.

An architecture firm is renovating a large medical laboratory in an existing building which has a minimal 11-foot-3-inch floor-to-floor height. Concerned that the client may not understand the implications of this tight dimension-which means that the fume hood ventilation system can not easily be installed within this space-the architects arrange visits of other labs with similar floor-to-floor heights, change in healthcare and society is rapid and increasingly unpredictable, bringing an unprecedented level of risk for healthcare organizations facing new projects. This guide discusses a specific tool that healthcare organizations and design professionals can use to help manage uncertainty: the facility visit. In almost every healthcare project someone-client, designer, or client-design team-visits other facilities to help them prepare for the project. A probing, well structured, and well run visit can highlight the range of possible design and operational alternatives, pinpoint potential problems, and build a design team that works together effectively over the course of a design project. It can help a team creatively break their existing paradigms for their current project and can provide a pool of experience that can inform other projects. All of these can help reduce risk for healthcare organizations.

However, current facility visits are often ineffective. They are frequently conducted quite casually, despite the rigor of much other healthcare planning and design. Visits are often costly—$40,000 or more-yet they often fall short of their potential. Sites are often chosen without careful consideration, little attention is given to clarifying the purpose or methods of visits, there is often little wrap-up, and frequently no final report is prepared. Not only is the money devoted to the visit frequently not used most effectively, the visit presents important opportunities to learn and to build a design team. These opportunities are too often squandered.

This guide focuses on what a facility field visit can accomplish and suggests ways to achieve these goals. Although a facility visit may occur in a variety of circumstances, including the redesign of the process of healthcare without any redesign of the physical setting, this guide focuses on situations in which architectural or interior design is being contemplated or is in process.

SCOPE OF THE RESEARCH

The goals of this project were to learn about the existing practice of conducting healthcare facility visits, to learn about the potential for extending their rigor and effectiveness, and to develop and test a new approach. We interviewed over 40 professionals in the fields of healthcare and design from every region of the US, including interior designers, architects, and clients who had participated in design projects, and healthcare professionals who conduct visits of their own facilities. We sampled professionals from large and small design firms, and from large and small medical organizations. To get a picture of both “average” and “excellent” practice we randomly selected members from professional organizations such as the AIA Academy on Architecture for Health and the American Society of Hospital Engineers, and augmented these with firms and individuals who were award winners or were recommended to us by top practitioners. We developed a multi-page questionnaire that probed the participants’ experiences with visits, including their reasons for participating, their methods, and how they used the information produced. We faxed each participant the questionnaire, then followed up with an interview on the phone or in person. The interviews averaged about one-and-a-half hours in length. Every person we initially contacted participated in an interview. Everyone in our sample had participated in some sort of visit of healthcare facilities within the past year.

After conducting the interviews we developed, field tested, and revised a new facility visit method, which is presented in this guide. Throughout this process we conferred with select members of the Research Committee of The Center for Health Design and the Project Advisory Board.

GOALS OF FACILITY VISITS

There are many reasons for doing a facility visit and many different kinds of visits. However, visits roughly fall into three categories: specific visits, departmental visits and general visits. Specific visits focus on particular issues such as the design of patient room headwalls, nursing stations, or gift shops; departmental visits focus on learning about the operations and design of whole departments such as outpatient imaging or neonatal intensive care; general visits are concerned with issues relevant to a whole institution, such as how to restructure operations to become patient-focused. Usually, departmental and general visits occur during programming or schematic design; specific visits often occur during design development, when decisions are being made about materials, finishes and equipment.

More broadly, there are several general reasons for conducting visits: learning about state-of-the art facilities; thinking about projects in new ways; and creating an effective design team.

LEARNING ABOUT STATE-OF-THE-ART FACILITIES

Visit participants want to learn what excellent organizations in their field, both competitors and other organizations, are doing. Participants are often particularly interested in learning how changes in business, technology or demographics, such as increased focus on outpatient facilities or increased criticality of inpatients, might affect their own operations and design. For example, in Story 1, below, a UK team was interested in grafting US experience onto a UK healthcare culture. In another example, hospital personnel at Georgia’s St. Joseph’s Hospital visited five emergency rooms over the course of several weeks before implementing an “express” service of their own. According to planner Greg Barker (Jay Farbstein & Associates, CA) they “use site visits as a method of exposing the clients to a broader range of operating philosophies and methods.” This gives the clients and design professionals a common frame of reference on which to base critical operational and design decisions.

William Headley, North Durham Acute Hospitals, UK

Traditionally, hospital design in the UK has been established centrally, with considerable emphasis placed on standard departmental areas and on a standardized planning format known as “Nucleus.” The 20-year-old Nucleus system is based on a standard cruciform template of approximately 1,000 square meters housing a multitude of departments, which can be interlinked to provide the nucleus of a District General Hospital.

Durham wished to develop a hospital that in its vision would meet the challenges of the 21st Century, and produce a custom-designed hospital solution built to suit the needs of the patient, not just individual departments.

The brief has, therefore, to be developed from a blank sheet of paper and not from standard guidelines. It is also the Trust’s objective to have the brief developed by staff from the bottom up. The purpose of the study tour was to allow frontline staff the opportunity to experience new ideas firsthand and talk to their medical counterparts about some of the philosophies of patient-focused care and to input their findings into the briefing process. We acknowledged the differences in the US and UK healthcare systems, but were interested in ensuring that best US practices, including the patient focused approach, facilities design, and the use of state of the art equipment, was studied and subsequently tailored to suit the new North Durham hospital.

THINKING ABOUT A PROJECT IN A NEW WAY

Participants who are currently engaged in a design or planning project are concerned with using visits to advance their own project. They use a visit to analyze innovative ideas and to help open the design team to new ideas. At the same time they are interested in building consensus on a preferred option. In Story 2, below, a hospital serves as a frequent visit host because it shows how special bay designs can be used in neonatal intensive care, and participants can consider how these designs apply to their current project. Other visit organizers see a visit as an opportunity for focusing the team on key decisions that need to be made, or to help the team focus in a systematic way on a range of strategic options and critical constraints. The visit exposes each team member to a variety of ways of accomplishing a similar program of requirements and thus starts the debate on how to achieve the best results for the facility being designed.

Georgia Brogdon, Vice President Operations, Gwinnett Women’s Pavilion, GA

We get visitors at our facility about once per month. Right now the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) is the most frequently visited location. The main reason is that Ohmeda uses our unit as a showcase for a special design of NICU bays. People want to see it because most think that Hill Rom is the only vendor of this type of equipment.

Early on, we were also one of the only state-of-the-art LDR facilities around. So if people wanted to visit an LDR unit, they had little choice but to come here. Now, however, people come to see us because we are a freestanding yet still attached facility. Over time the visits have evolved away from the design of the facility and more into programming, services, and operational issues.

We give three types of visits: 1) overview visits for lay people who just want to come see the area; 2) functional visits for other hospital people or architects who want to see the LDR design, mother/baby floor, NICU design, etc.; 3) operational flow visits to learn how the LDR concept impacts operations. In general, we start the visitors wherever the patient would start in the facility.

To arrange a successful visit of our facility, we need to know the interests of the visitors; then we can focus the schedule on that. Also knowing who they are bringing is helpful. You need to have their counterparts available. The types of information needed to conduct facility visits are: 1) what specific operational information to ask for in advance-size, number of rooms, number of physicians, staffing, C-section rate, whether they are a trauma center; 2) how to prepare for the visit; 3) who to bring. We’ve found that periodically the visitors are disappointed because they didn’t bring enough people. Better to have too many than not enough.

CREATING AN EFFECTIVE DESIGN TEAM

Participants use visits as an opportunity for team building. Many visits are conducted early in a design project by a team who will work together for several years. The visit provides participants a useful opportunity to get to know each other and to build an effective team. As Story 3 illustrates, clients often look to a visit to see how well designers can understand their needs; designers use it as a way to learn about their clients and to mutually explore new ideas. A visit can also provide an opportunity for medical programmers to work with designers and clients. This is particularly important if programming and design are done by different firms.

Many visit participants focus on interpersonal issues: spending several days with someone helps build a personal relationship that one can rely on during a multi-year project. A visit also provides the opportunity to achieve other aspects of team building: clarifying values, goals, roles and expertise of individual participants; and identifying conflicts early so they can be resolved. One result for some teams is that it establishes a common vocabulary of operational and facility terms translated to the local healthcare facility.

Bing Zillmer, Director Engineering Services, Lutheran Hospital, La Crosse, WI

Conducting a facility field visit is an opportunity to have that one-on-one contact and find out if the architect “walks the talk or talks the walk.” The biggest benefit is in finding out how the visit team of the architectural firm has been assembled: to see their level of participation, and how they have interacted with and listened to the clients and the hosts. What we look for in a consultant is not a “yes man”; we look for someone who knows more about existing facilities than we do. Our key concerns are how the team worked together, how they listened.

Dennis C. Lagatta, Vice President, Ellerbe Becket, Washington, DC

The main reason for conducting a visit is to settle an issue with the client. The clients usually have only two frames of reference: the current facility and the one where they were trained. These two frames of reference are hard to overcome without a visit. We conduct visits to help settle an issue between various groups within the institution. The visit process tends to be a good political way to illustrate a problem or a solution to a problem. A good example is when you have a dispute between critical care physicians and surgeons. Both parties may be unwilling to compromise. Usually a visit will be a good way to defuse this conflict.

James W. Evans, Facilities Director, Heartland Health System, St. Louis, MO

Responding to the question, what kinds of team-building activities were conducted before the actual visit took place? The functional space program stage is where you start building a team. Functional space programming is a narrative of what you want to do. If the programming includes a laboratory or some other specialty area, you would also want to have the consultant (if you are using one) involved in this process. Between blocks and schematics is when you want to go on any visits. By working together and staying together through big and small projects, you develop a lot of rapport and credibility.

Les Saunders, Nix Mann And Associates, Architects, Atlanta, GA

In the case of marketing visits, we try and present our unique abilities to our clients and to get to know each other better, Our visits are generally tailored to what the client group is trying to accomplish. Our functional experts will go on the visit so they can get to know the client and try to enhance “bonding.”

Facility visits allow healthcare organizations and design professionals to address several important trends in healthcare.

• A visit allows a team to understand the experience of stakeholders who they do not currently serve, and to examine the design and operations of facilities that are more customer-oriented.
• Social changes are resulting in some stakeholder groups gaining importance, such as outpatients involved in more complex procedures, higher acuity inpatients, older people, or non-English speakers.
• A visit can provide quantitative and qualitative data that support future decision making.
• Tighter budgets, shorter design and construction schedules and more complex projects are requiring design teams to form more quickly and work more effectively.
• A visit can be an effective tool for building a design team early in a design project.

FALLING SHORT OF THEIR POTENTIAL

In a design project, the client healthcare organization generally pays for a visit, either directly or as a part of design fees. Do healthcare organizations usually get good value for their investment? Do visits generally achieve their ambitious goals of learning about competition and change, moving the design project along, and building teams? We found very different answers. Despite the usual rigor of healthcare planning and programming, many current visits are very casual. Whereas some planners of visits do careful searches of available facilities to fit specific criteria, most choose sites to visit in other ways— sites participants happen to already know because they have been written about in magazines, or sites where there is a contact that someone on the team knows. Though these ways of choosing sites may be appropriate, they raise a question as to whether most participants are visiting the best sites for their purposes.

In many cases visit teams simply do not spend much time structuring the visit. Most teams do not even meet in advance to decide the major foci of the visit. We did not find many groups who use checklists or sets of questions or criteria when they go into the field. Whereas some teams compile the participants’ notes, and one team actually created a videotape in a large project, most teams do not create any kind of written or visual record of their visit. Many teams hold no meeting at the end to discuss the implications of the visit, although many participants felt that they emerged in subsequent programming or design meetings.

Despite the apparent casualness of these visits, designers and clients alike almost without exception felt they were a valuable resource.

Simply visiting a well-run facility can be vivid and exciting. It is fascinating to see how excellent competitors operate, to talk to them and learn of their experience. (It is also an excellent opportunity for administrators and designers to get away from their daily routine and talk to professional counterparts.)

But there are large opportunity costs in the way most current visits are run, and they represent considerable lost value for the healthcare organization, designer, and design project.

COMMON PITFALLS

Opportunity costs of current visits come from several common pitfalls.

LOW EXPECTATIONS LEAD TO LIMITED BENEFITS

Often, participants see field visits as a way to get to know other team members and simply to see other sites, but have no clear idea about what information can be helpful to the project at hand. They don’t think through how the visit can help the goals of their project or organization.

TOO BUSY TO PLAN

The planner of a visit faces multiple problems. Often the visit is seen as a minor part of the job of most participants and doesn’t get much attention in advance; schedules and participants may change at the last minute. In many cases, no one is assigned to develop the overall plan of the visit, and to ask if the major components-choice of sites, choice of issues to investigate, methods for visits, ways of creating and disseminating a report-match the overall goals of the organization and project. This is especially ironic because participants are often advocates of careful planning in other areas.

TOO FOCUSED ON MARKETING

Many visits, and especially designer-client visits, are billed as data gathering but are in fact aimed at marketing. A design firm may literally be marketing services or may be trying to get a client to accept a solution that they have already developed: marketing an idea. This may lead to an attempt to create a perfect situation in the facility being visited, one without rush, bustle, or everyday users and the information they can provide. For designer-client teams, we heard many designers complain that they couldn’t control their clients, that they couldn’t keep them focused on prearranged ideas or keep them limited to prearranged routes. (This is often the result of not enough advance work aimed at understanding what interests the participants have and not enough time spent building common goals.)

CLOSING THE RANGE OF DESIGN OPTIONS TOO EARLY

Many visits occur early in the design process or when an organization is considering significant change, a perfect time to consider new possibilities or address issues and solutions not previously considered. This timing, and the chance to see and discuss new options in a visit, presents an opportunity for a design team to open its range of choices and consider novel or creative alternatives. However, many visit participants feel strong pressures to “already know the answer” when they start the visit. Many designers and consultants feel that their clients do not want them to genuinely explore a range of options, that they were hired because they know the solution. Similarly, some medical professionals establish positions early to avoid seeming foolish or uninformed. As a result, the team may choose sites that bring only confirmation, not surprise, and people will be interviewed who bring a viewpoint that is already well established. This is not simply a matter of the individual personalities of people who set up visits, but rather a problem of the design of teams and the context within which they operate. It is often important for a design firm to show a client the approach it is advocating and for them to jointly explore its suitability for the client’s project. However, if the client expects a designer to know the answer before the process starts, rather than developing it jointly with the client, the designer is forced to use the visit to exhort rather than to investigate.

TOO LITTLE STRUCTURE FOR THE VISIT

Whereas no one likes to be burdened with unnecessary paperwork before or during a visit, it is easy to miss key issues if there is not an effort to establish issues in advance, with a reminder during the visit. Seeing a new place, with lots of activity and complexity, makes it easy to miss some key features. Many team members come back from visits with a clear idea of some irrelevant unique feature such as the sculpture in the hallway, rather than the aspect of the site that was being investigated.

INTERVIEWING THE WRONG PEOPLE

Often, out of organizational procedure or courtesy, a site being visited will assign an administrator or person from public relations to be the primary guide. It is almost always preferable to interview people familiar with the daily operations of the department or site.

MISSING CRITICAL STAKEHOLDERS

Almost every healthcare facility is attempting to become more responsive to customers, both patients and “internal” customers such as staff. Patients often now have a choice of healthcare providers, and staff are costly to replace. Despite these trends, many visits miss some key customer groups such as inpatients, outpatients, visitors, line staff, and maintenance staff. It is very important that these groups or people who have close contact with them be represented in visits.

A DESIGNER PROVIDING TOO MUCH DIRECTION DURING A DESIGNERCLIENT VISIT

In an effort to control the outcome, a designer may attempt to ask most of the questions during interviews. In addition to the problem of focusing exclusively on “selling” ideas described above, clients do not like to feel that their role is usurped.

MISSING OPPORTUNITIES FOR TEAM BUILDING

Teams are most effective when everyone understands the values, goals, expertise and specific roles of others on the team. Teams are also most effective when the team understands the process and resources of the team, the nature of the final product, how the final product will be used: who will evaluate it, and by what criteria the success of the product will be evaluated. Although management consultants routinely recommend making such issues explicit at the beginning of team building, we found few visit teams that deal with these issues directly. Many teams do not even get together before a visit to discuss these issues.

NOT ATTENDING TO CREATING A COMMON LANGUAGE

Multidisciplinary design teams often speak different professional languages and have different interests and values. Designers are used to reading plans and thinking in terms of space and materials; healthcare administrators are used to thinking in terms of words and operational plans. Unless a field visit team is conscious about making links between space and operations, there can be little opportunity to establish agreement.

LACK OF AN ACCESSIBLE VISIT REPORT

Most current visits produce no report at all; some produce at least a compilation of handwritten notes. We heard a repeated problem: no one could remember where they saw a given feature.

CHAPTER 1:  MAJOR TASKS

The healthcare facility visit process has three major phases, divided into specific team tasks that are conducted before, during, and after a visit. These phases, and the 13 major tasks that comprise them, are below. The process we propose is quite straightforward, but compared to most current visits it is more deliberate about defining goals, thinking through what will be observed, preparing a report, and being clear about the implications of the visit for the current design project.

PREPARATION

TASK 1. SUMMARIZE THE DESIGN PROJECT

In this task the project leader or others prepare a brief description of the goals, philosophy, scope, and major constraints overview of the design project that the visit is intended to aid. It should include the shortcomings that the design project is to resolve: space limitations, operational inefficiencies, deferred maintenance, etc.

The overview helps focus the facility visit, and can be provided to the host sites to help them understand the perspective of the visit. This summary should be brief, only a few pages of bulleted items, but should clearly identify the strategic decisions the team is facing. For example, a team may be considering whether to develop a freestanding or attached woman’s pavilion. It is also important to identify key operational questions in the project summary. Focusing on design solutions too early may distract the team from more fundamental questions that need to be resolved. The purpose of the summary is to establish a common understanding of goals, build a common understanding of constraints, and allow the visit hosts to prepare for the visit.

The summary of the design project may focus on several topics:

• How do these critical purposes link to key business imperatives, such as “broadening the base of patients” or “allowing nurses to spend more time delivering patient care”?
• What measurable or observable aspects of the design relate to these key purposes? For example, one team may be interested in whether carpeting leads to increased cleaning costs or increased infection rates; another team may be interested in visitor satisfaction with a self-service gift shop.

Key issues in summarizing the design project:

• It should identify the full range of stakeholders who affect the current design.

Note: Many visits ignore this critical up-front work. Depending on the schedule and scope, the summary can be circulated to the team in advance of the brainstorming meeting.

TASK 2. PREPARE BACKGROUND BRIEF

More than most building types, healthcare facilities have a large body of literature providing descriptions of new trends, research, design guidelines, and post-occupancy evaluations. Many design firms and healthcare organizations have this material in their library or can get it from local universities or medical schools. In this task the visit organizer creates a file of a few key articles or book chapters describing the issue or facility type being visited. These are then distributed to the team, allowing all team members to have at least a minimal current understanding of operations and design.

The team leader also prepares an Issues Worksheet. This is a one-page form that is distributed along with the Background Brief to all members of the visit team prior to their first meeting. (See Figure 2 for a sample Issues Worksheet.) It encourages them to jot down what is important to them, and to discuss issues with their coworkers. It works most effectively when the visit organizer adds some typical issues to help them think through the problem. Participants should be encouraged to bring the Worksheet with them to the team meetings.

Key issues in preparing the Background Brief:

• Providing a few current background articles on the kind of department, facility, or process being visited helps create at least a minimum level of competence for the team and helps establish a common vocabulary prior to the visit.
• The Issues Worksheet, along with the Project Summary and Background Brief, allows participants to develop a picture of the project and to brainstorm ideas.

TASK 3. PREPARE DRAFT WORK PLAN AND BUDGET

Once the team leader or others have summarized the design project and prepared the Background Brief, a draft work plan outlining the major components of the field visits can be prepared. At this stage, it is important to establish a tentative budget for the visit. It is also important to make sure that the major components of the draft work plan, such as choosing visit sites and developing critical issues, match the overall goals of the organization and project. The draft work plan provides a tentative structure for the field visits, which can be modified by other team members.

Key issues in preparing the draft work plan:

TASK 4. CHOOSE AND INVITE PARTICIPANTS

The effectiveness of the team is, of course, most directly related to the nature of the participants. Field visit teams are sometimes chosen for reasons such as politics, or as a reward for good service, rather than for their relevance to the project. For healthcare organizations field visit teams are usually most successful if they mix the decision makers who will be empowered to make design decisions with people who have direct experience in working in the area or department being studied. For design firms, teams are often most successful if they include a principal and the project staff. In both of these cases, the team combines an overall strategic view of the organization and project with an intimate knowledge of operational and design details.

Key issues in choosing participants:

• Participants should be chosen with a clear view of why they need to participate and what their responsibility is in planning, conducting and writing up the visit.
• Site hosts say that teams larger than about seven tend to disrupt their operations.

TASK 5. CONDUCT TEAM ISSUES SESSION

It is usually advisable to hold a team meeting early in the visit planning process to: 1) clarify the purposes and general methods of the field visit; 2) build an effective visit team by clarifying the perspective and role of each participant; 3) ‘identify potential sites, if the visit sites have not already been selected. Some resources and methods to select sites are discussed further in the next section, “Critical Issues in Conducting Facility Visits.”

The issues session is often a “structured brainstorming” meeting aimed at getting a large number of ideas on the table. (This is particularly important during departmental and general visits, and if team members don’t know each other.) The purpose is opening the range of possible issues rather than focusing on a single alternative.

This meeting is typically aimed at building a common sense of purpose for all team members, rather than marketing a preconceived idea. This meeting also serves the purpose of making critical decisions regarding the choice of sites and identifying who at the sites should be contacted.

Each participant should bring his or her Issues Worksheet along to the meeting. The initial task is to get all questions and information needs onto a flip chart pad or board before any prioritization goes on. Then the leader and group can sort these into categories and discuss priorities. These categories and priorities may be sorted in the form of lists which include: 1) a list of critical purposes of the departments or features being designed; 2) a list of critical purposes of the departments or features being evaluated at each facility during visits; 3) a list of existing and innovative design features relevant to these purposes. The critical purposes of the departments or design features at existing facilities can be charted at different spatial levels of the facilities, such as: site, entrance, public spaces, clinical spaces, administrative and support areas. Some typical architectural design issues are provided in the appendix.

The issues session may be run by the leader or the facilitator. Because one of the purposes of this meeting is to get balanced participation, it may be useful to have someone experienced in group process run the meeting, rather than the leader. His or her job is to make sure everyone participates, allowing the leader to focus on content.

This meeting may also provide an early opportunity to identify potential problems in conflicting goals, values or personalities on the team. For instance, a healthcare facility design project may have significant conflicts between departments, or between physicians and administrators. The meeting may also allow the team to agree on basic business imperatives and to be clear about the constraints that are of greatest importance to them, such as “never having radioactive materials cross the path of patients.”

Key points in running an issues session:

• Everyone should be able to participate without feeling “dumb.”
• The leader and group should try to understand the range of interests and priorities represented.
• Brief notes of the meeting should be distributed to all participants.

Note: This meeting is successful if participants feel they can express ideas, interests, and concerns without negative consequences from other members of the team. There is no such thing as a stupid question in this meeting.

TASK 6. IDENTIFY POTENTIAL SITES AND CONFIRM WITH THE TEAM

Based on the work plan which established the visit objectives and the desires, interests and budget of the team, the visit organizer chooses potential sites, and checks with the team. If possible, he or she provides some background information about each site to help the team make decisions.

The team may know of some sites they would like to visit, and these might have emerged in the issues session. Otherwise there are a range of sources for finding appropriate sites to visit: national organizations such as the American Hospital Association, as well as the American Institute of Architects Academy on Architecture for Health Facilities, and a range of magazines that discuss healthcare facilities. (See the section below entitled “Choosing Sites.“)

Different teams pick sites for different reasons. Some may pick a site because it is the best example of an operational approach such as “patient-focused care.” Others may look for diversity within a given set of constraints, such as different basic layouts of 250-bed inpatient facilities.

Many visit leaders complain that the team sometimes is distracted by features outside the focus of the tour, and particularly by poor maintenance. Wherever possible, it is advisable for the visit organizers to tour the site in advance of the group visit and to brief the hosts in person about the purposes of the visit. Although it is rare, some sites now charge for visits.

A key issue in choosing sites:

• The selection of sites should challenge the team to think in new ways.

Note: Sites are often chosen to provide a clear range of choices within a set of constraints provided by operations, budget, or existing conditions, such as “different layouts of express emergency departments” or “different designs of labor-delivery-post-partum-recovery rooms.”

TASK 7. SCHEDULE SITES AND CONFIRM AGENDA

The leader or facilitator calls a representative at each host site to schedule the visit. He or she confirms the purposes of the visit, confirms with the host sites the information needed before and during the field visit, and confirms who will be interviewed at the site. Healthcare facilities are sometimes more responsive to a request for a visit if they are called by a healthcare professional or administrator rather than a designer: if someone on the team knows someone at a site, he or she may want to make the first phone call. Many teams also find that if they arrange for a very brief visit, this may be extended a bit on site when the hosts become engaged with the team. When confirming the schedule for the visit with the host facilities, the visit organizer should specify that the visit team would prefer to interview people familiar with the daily operations of the department or site.

Key issues in scheduling sites:

Note: Sites are often proud of their facilities and often enjoy receiving distinguished visitors. However, they often find it difficult to arrange interviews or assemble detailed information on the spot.

TASK 8. PREPARE FIELD VISIT PACKAGE

Visits are more effective if participants are provided a package of information in advance: information about schedule, accommodations, and contact people; information about each site, including, where possible, brief background information and plans; a simple form for recording information; and a “tickler” list of questions and issues.

a) Prepare visit information package

The organizers should provide participants information about the logistics of the field visit: schedules, reservation confirmation numbers, phone numbers of sites and hotels.

b) Prepare site information package

The site information package orients participants to the site in advance of the visit. Depending on what information is available, it may include: plans and photos of each site; basic organizational information about the site (client name and address, mission statement, patient load, size, date, designers, etc.); description of special features or processes or other items of interest. Whereas measured plans are best, these are not often available. Fire evacuation plans can be used. A sample site information package is provided in the Appendix. Many teams find it useful to review job descriptions for the host site, and many organizations have these readily available.

c) Prepare Visit Worksheet

Facility visits are often overwhelming in the amount of information they present. It is useful for the organizers to provide the participants with a worksheet for taking notes. We have provided a sample worksheet as Figure 3 below, and blank forms are provided in the Appendix. The purpose of the checklist is to remind participants of the key issues and to provide a form that can easily be assembled into the trip report.

Note: A successful worksheet directs participants to the agreed-upon focal issues without burdening them with unnecessary paperwork. Participants should understand the relationship between filling out the checklist and filling out the final report.

FACILITY VISIT

TASK 9. CONDUCT FACILITY FIELD VISIT

The actual site visit typically includes: 1) an initial orientation interview with people at the site familiar with the department or setting being investigated; 2) a touring interview where the team, or part of it, visits the facility being investigated with someone familiar with daily operations, asking questions and observing operations; 3) recording the site; 4) conducting a wrap-up meeting at the site. (Each of these steps is discussed individually below.) The interview sessions are focused on helping the team understand a wider range of implications and possibilities. If appropriate, the wrap-up session may also be used for focusing on key issues that move the design along.

Note: Participants often like to speak to their counterparts: head nurse to head nurse, medical director to medical director, etc., although everyone seems to like to talk to people directly involved with running a facility such as a head nurse. People who know daily operations are often more useful than a high-level administrator or public relations staff member.

a) Conduct site orientation interview

During the orientation interview the visit team meets briefly with a representative of the site to get an overall orientation to the site: layout and general organization; mission and philosophy; brief history and strategic plans; patient load; treatment load; and other descriptions of the site. Many teams are also interested in learning about experiences the healthcare organization had with the process of planning, design, construction and facility management: What steps did they use? What innovations did they come up with? What problems did they encounter? What are they particularly proud of? What do they wish they had done differently?

b) Conduct a touring interview

The touring interview was developed by a building evaluation group in New Zealand and by several other post-occupancy evaluation researchers and practitioners. (See the post-occupancy evaluation section of the Bibliography.) In the touring interview, the team, or a portion of it, visits a portion of the site to understand the design and operations. Conducting an interview in the actual department being discussed often brings a vividness and specificity that may be lacking in an interview held in a meeting room or on the phone. One of the great strengths of the touring interview is the surprises it may bring, and the option it provides to consider new possibilities or to deal with unanticipated problems. As a result, it often works best to start with fairly open-ended questions:

• What works well here? What works less well?
• What are the major goals and operational philosophy of the department?
• What is the flow of patients, staff, visitors, meals, supplies, records, laundry, trash?
• Can they demonstrate a sample process or procedure, such as how a patient moves from the waiting room to gowning area to treatment area?
• What are they most proud of?
• What would they do differently if they could do it over?

These questions also provide a nonthreatening way to discuss shortcomings or issues that are potentially controversial. The team may then want to focus on the specific concerns that were raised in the issues session.

A difficult, but critically important, thing to avoid in a touring interview is to become distracted by idiosyncratic details of the site being visited. Often operational patterns or philosophy are more important than specific design features that will not be generalized to a new project: how equipment is allocated to labor-delivery-recovery-postpartum rooms in the site being visited may be more important than the color scheme, even though the color may be more striking.

Large multidisciplinary teams are particularly hard to manage during a touring interview. A given facility may have a state-of-the-art imaging department that is of great interest to the radiologists on the team but may have a mediocre rehabilitation department. In these cases, some of the touring interviews may be focused on “what the host would do differently next time.”

Key issues in conducting the touring interview:

Note: It is important to include people familiar with daily operations on the touring interview, both on the team side and on the side of the site being visited. A frequent problem is that some stakeholder groups such as patients or visitors are not represented; special efforts should be taken to understand the perspectives of these groups.

c) Document the visit

The goals of the visit dictate the kinds of documentation that are appropriate. However, most visits call for a visual record, sketches, and written notes.

In most cases it is useful to designate one or more “official” recorders who will assemble notes and be sure photos are taken, measurements made, plans and documents procured, etc. For designer-client visits, it is often useful to have at least two official recorders to look after both design and operational concerns. However, because a team often splits up, most or all participants may need to keep notes.

It is quite rare for teams to use video to record their visit, although this seems to be increasing in popularity. Editing videos can be very costly: it may take a staff member several person-days in a professional editing facility to edit several hours of raw video down to a 10- or 15- minute length. However, this time may be reduced with the increased availability of inexpensive microcomputer-based editing programs.

Key issues in recording the facility:

Many departmental and general visit teams find it useful to photographically record key flows, such as patients, staff and supplies, and location of waiting rooms and other patient amenities.

Note: If the method of creating the documentation is established in advance it can easily be assembled into a draft report.

d) Conduct on-site wrap-up meeting

Whereas the visit interview is focused on opening options for the team and identifying new problems and issues, the wrap-up meeting is often more focused on clarifying how lessons learned on the visit relate to the design project, and how they begin to answer the questions the team established. It is often useful to have a representative of the host site present at the wrap-up meeting to answer questions, if their time allows.

Key issues in conducting wrap-up meetings:

TASK 10. ASSEMBLE DRAFT VISIT REPORT

A draft visit report may take many different formats. The simplest is to photocopy and assemble all participants’ worksheets and notes, retyping where necessary. Alternatively, the organizers or a portion of the team may edit and synthesize the worksheets and notes. Though more time consuming, this usually results in a more readable report. A somewhat more sophisticated version is to establish a database record that resembles the form used to take notes on-site in a program such as FoxPro, Dbase, or FileMaker Pro. Participants’ comments can be typed into the database and sketches and graphics can be scanned in and attached.

These are then provided to all participants.

A key issue in assembling the draft report:

• Simplicity is often best; simply photocopying or retyping notes is often adequate, especially if photos and sketches are attached.

TASK 11. CONDUCT FOCUS MEETING

Upon returning home, the team conducts a meeting to review the draft trip report and to ask:

Unlike the issues session held early in the visit planning process, which was primarily concerned with bringing out a wide range of goals and options, this meeting is typically more aimed at establishing consensus about directions for the project.

A key issue in conducting the focus meeting:

• The purpose of the focus meeting is to establish the lessons learned for the design project.

Note: The leader should carefully consider who is invited to the focus meeting. This may include others from the design firm, consultants, healthcare organization, or even representatives from the site.

TASK 12. PREPARE FOCUS REPORT

The focus report briefly summarizes the key conclusions of the visit for the visit team and for later use by the entire design team. It is an executive summary of the visit report which may provide a number of pages of observations and interview notes.

Key issues in preparing the focus report:

• The focus report should be a clear, brief, jargon-free summary.

TASK 13. USE DATA TO INFORM DESIGN

The key purpose of a facility visit is to inform design. Whereas this can occur informally in subsequent conversations and team meetings, it is best achieved by also being proactive. For example, the team can:

Key issues in using data to inform design:

• Reports and materials collected on visits should be available to all participants in the design process and should be on hand during subsequent meetings. A central archive of materials should be available and should be indexed to allow easy access for people involved in future projects.

CHAPTER 2:  TOOL KIT

TASK CHECKLIST

The team leader prepares a brief summary of the goals, philosophy, scope, and major constraints of the design project to help focus the field visit.

• Prepare a list of design or operational features related to these critical purposes.

The team leader prepares a file of a few key articles or book chapters that provide descriptions of new trends, research, design guidelines and post-occupancy evaluations of the facility type, department or issue being studied. He or she also prepares Issues Worksheets for team members to make notes on prior to the initial issues brainstorming session.

• Assemble current literature on existing facilities. Prepare the Issues Worksheet.

The draft work plan clarifies the values, goals, process, schedule and resources of the visits.

In this task the team leader builds a team. The ideal team combines a view of the overall strategic perspective of the organization and project with an intimate knowledge of daily operations.

The team issues session has three purposes: 1) clarify the purposes and general methods for the field visit; 2) build an effective team; 3) identify potential sites. The issues session is often a “structured brainstorming” meeting aimed at getting a large number of ideas on the table, and at understanding the various perspectives of the team.

• Clarify the resources available to the team and the use of the information collected.

TASK 6. IDENTIFY POTENTIAL SITES AND START FACILlTY VISIT PACKAGE

Based on visit objectives and the desires, interests and budget of the team, the visit organizers choose potential sites and check with the team. If possible they provide some background information about each site.

• If field investigation sites are already selected, provide fact sheets about each site to the participants.

In this task, the purposes and schedule of the visit are confirmed with the sites. This should occur at least two weeks before the visit.

The field investigation package includes the following components, which are used for conducting the visit:

• Tour information package (tour itineraries, transportation and accommodation details, list of contact people at each facility).
• Site information package (description of the sites, background information, facility plans).
• Site Visit Worksheets for notetaking.

TASK 9. CONDUCT FIELD VISIT

The interview sessions are focused on opening: helping the team understand a wider range of implications and possibilities. If appropriate, the wrap-up session may also be used for focusing on key issues that move the design along. Conduct site orientation interview.

• Collect any additional information from the host site.
• Conduct touring interview with people familiar with daily operations and a range of stakeholders.
• Document the visit through notes, sketches and photos.
• Conduct on-site wrap-up meeting with team members.

The draft report is a straightforward document allowing others to benefit from the investigation and providing the team a common document to work from.

The team conducts a focus meeting to ask: What are the major lessons of the investigation? What does it tell the team about the current project?

The Focus Report briefly summarizes the key conclusions of the visit for the visit team and for later use by the entire design team. It is an executive summary of the Visit Report which may provide a number of pages of observations and interview notes.

• Prepare and distribute a brief Focus Report.

The purpose of this document is to inform the design process.

• Write a brief newsletter about the design project that includes key findings from the visit.

SAMPLE FACILITY FACT SHEET (see PDF version)

CHAPTER 3:  CRITICAL ISSUES IN CONDUCTING FACILITY VISITS

Selecting visit sites.

One of the most important steps in conducting healthcare facility visits is the selection of appropriate sites. However, there is no single source of information on healthcare facilities, and site selection is not an easy task. It is difficult to locate sites with comparable features in terms of workload, size, budget, operational facilities and physical features. Without this information, the tendency is to choose sites based on other criteria, such as location and proximity, or the presence of a friend or former coworker at specific host facilities.

However, depending on the nature of the facility visit, there are several resources that can be consulted for site selection. Some healthcare and design professional associations periodically publish guides and reference books which are helpful in selecting sites for facility visits. The following sources can be referred to before selecting specific facilities for field visits:

NATIONAL HEALTHCARE ASSOCIATIONS

American Hospital Association (AHA) AHA Resource Center, Chicago, (312) 280-6000

AHA database for healthcare facilities in the state of Missouri. : Missouri Hospitals Profile . Listed price: $27.50.

AHA Guide to locating healthcare facilities in the US . The listed facilities are classified according to the city/county with a coded format for the number of beds, admission fee, etc. Listed price: $195 for nonmembers and $75 for members.

AHA Health Care Construction Database Survey . Contact Robert Zank at the AHA Division of Health Facilities Management, (312) 280-5910.

Association of Health Facilities Survey Agency (AHFSA) Directory of the Association of Health Facilities Survey Agency. AHFSA, Springfield, IL.

National Association of Health Data Organizations (NAHDO) Some states collect detailed hospital-level data. To obtain information on states with legislative mandates to gather hospital-level data, contact Stacey Carman at 254 B N. Washington Street, Falls Church, VA 22046-4517, Telephone: (703) 532-3282, FAX: (703) 5323593.

NATIONAL ASSOCIATIONS FOR DESIGN PROFESSIONALS

American Institute of Architects (AIA) AIA Academy on Architecture for Health 1735 New York Avenue NW Washington, DC 20006

(202) 626-7493 or (202) 626-7366, FAX (202) 626-7587 To order AIA publications: (800) 365-2724

Hospital Interior Architect .

Hospital and Health Care Facilities, 1992. Listed price: $48.50 for nonmembers; 10% discount for members off listed price.

Hospitals and Health Systems Review, July 1994. Listed price: $12.95 for nonmembers; 30 % discount for members off listed price.

Hospital Planning . Listed price: $37.50 for nonmembers; 10% discount for members off listed price.

Hospital Special Care Facility , 1993.

Organizational Change: Transforming Today’s Hospitals, January 1995: Listed price: $36.00 for nonmembers; 30% discount for members off listed price.

Health Facilities Review (biannual), 1993. Listed price: $20 for nonmembers; $14 for members.

PERIODICALS DESCRIBING SPECIFIC HEALTHCARE FACILITIES

Modern Healthcare. This national weekly business news magazine for healthcare management is published by Crain Communication, and holds annual design awards. In conjunction with AIA Academy of Architecture for Health, this periodical announces annual competition and honors architectural projects that build on changes in healthcare delivery. Contact Joan Fitzgerald or Mary Chamberlain at 740 N. Rush Street, Chicago IL 60611-2590, (312) 649-5355.

American Hospital Association Exhibition of Architecture for Health , 1993.

For further information contact Robert Zank at the Division of Health Facilities Management, (312) 280-5910.

Journal of Healthcare Design . This journal illustrates 20-40 exemplary healthcare facilities in each

annual issue. Free list of previously-toured exemplary facilities (available by calling The Center).

Æsclepius . Æsclepius is a newsletter discussing a range of design issues relevant to healthcare facilities.

TEAMBUILDING

Many people who conduct healthcare facility field visits use them as a way to build an ongoing design team. This is particularly true of designer-client-consultant teams who conduct visits early in a design project. According to organizational researcher and consultant J. Richard Hackman, 1 teams often spend too much time worrying about the “feelgood” aspects of interpersonal relationships and not enough time focusing on other key issues such as choosing the right people for the team, making roles and resources clear, specifying final products, and clarifying how the final product will be used.

Participants are often chosen because they are upper-level administrators or because they deserve the perk. It may not be clear what their function is on the visit or how they would contribute to any later decision making about the design project. Likewise, visit teams often don’t know what resources are available to them: Can they visit national sites? Can they call on others to help prepare and distribute a visit report?

• Some key team building steps include:
• Select visit participants with a clear idea of why they are participating and how they can contribute.
• Keep the team small; visit teams of more than seven or eight people are hard to manage.
• Provide each participant a clear role before, during and after the actual site visit, and negotiate this role to fit their interests and skills. Roles should be clearly differentiated and clear to all participants.
• Make the final product clear: simple photocopying and assembly of notes and photos taken during the visit; brief illustrated written report; videotape, etc.
• Clarify how the visit findings are to be used: what key decisions are the major focus?

ROLES IN CONDUCTING FACILITY VISITS

There are several key roles in the process. Depending on the size of the team and the nature of the visit, each role may be taken on by a different person, or they may be combined.

LEADERSHIP TASKS:

• Restate current need and parameters of the design project.
• Develop some background information on the issues or setting types being investigated, and distribute to team members.
• Conduct a brainstorming meeting to understand the expertise, interests, values, and goals of each team member.
• Identify potential visit team members, and invite them.
• Summarize the goals of the design project, clarify how the field visit might advance these goals, and communicate these to the team.
• Identify roles for each team member.
• Develop a work plan and budget.
• Clarify the criteria for choosing sites.
• Prepare and/or review major documents: site-specific protocols; checklists and lists of questions and issues; information about each site being visited; overall plan for the visit; visit report; focus report.
• Conduct wrap-up meeting at each site.
• Conduct focus meeting on returning home.

SUPPORT TASKS:

• Assemble a few key articles or other documents to help the team understand the key issues in the setting types, processes or departments being visited.
• Identify potential sites, with some information about each site candidate so the leader and team can make final choices.
• Confirm with sites, and clarify what information the team will need in advance and what will be collected during the visit.
• Prepare draft materials (Background Brief, site information package, visit information, interview protocol) for review by the leader.
• Organize any trip logistics that are not done individually by participants: car rentals, hotel reservations, air tickets, etc.
• Write thank-you letters to site participants.
• Prepare a Draft Visit Report for review by the leader and team.
• Draft a Focus Report for review by the leader and the team.

FACILITATION TASKS:

When the team is attempting to get broad input into the process, such as when the team meets initially to set direction, it is often useful to have someone run the meeting who has the role of simply looking after the process of the meeting, rather than the content. He or she is charged with making sure that everyone is heard without prejudice, and that all positions are brought out. It often works poorly to have a senior manager in this role. Even if he or she has good facilitation skills, it is intimidating for many people to speak up in a meeting led by their boss.

Specific tasks:

• Conduct the initial brainstorming session that establishes the direction, issues and roles for the visit.
• Conduct any additional sessions where balanced participation is important to increasing the pool of ideas or getting “buy-in” from all team members.

RECORDER TASKS:

During the actual site visit, one or more people are typically charged with maintaining the “official” records of the visit (individuals may keep their own notes as well). This may include written notes, audio or video records, or photographs. If the team breaks up during the visit, a recorder should accompany each group.

Specific tasks include:

• Procure any required recording devices and supplies, such as cameras, tape recorders, paper forms, etc.
• Make records during the visit.
• Edit the record and assemble into a report.

TEAM PARTICIPANTS TASKS:

INTERVIEWING

Interviews vary greatly in the amount of control exercised by the interviewer in choosing the topic for discussion and in structuring the response. An intermediate level of control over topic and responses, often called a “structured interview,” is usually appropriate in a facility visit. In a structured interview, the interviewer has an interview schedule which is a detailed list of questions or issues which serves as a general map of the discussion. However, the interviewer allows the respondent to answer in his or her own words and to follow his or her own order of questioning if desired. The interview is usually aided by walking through the setting or by having plans or other visual aids during seated sessions.

The use of fixed responses, in which respondents have to choose a “best” alternative among several presented, allows rapid analysis of results and may be appropriate if a large number of people are interviewed during a visit. The cost-effectiveness of interviews needs to be considered by the architect or manager when designing the process. Individual interviews are useful because people being questioned may be more forthcoming than if friends or colleagues are present.

However, individual interviews are expensive. With scheduling, waiting time, running the interview, and coding, a brief individual interview may involve several hours or more of staff time.

In summary, interviews are valuable because people can directly communicate their feelings, motives and actions. However, interviews are limited by people’s desire to be socially desirable or by their faulty memories, although these problems may not be too serious unless the questions are very sensitive.

CHAPTER 4:  CONCLUSIONS

Unfortunately, many design processes do not do a good job at controlling risks, costs, and inefficiencies. A design project may have a big influence on the future of an organization, but critical operational and design decisions often receive too little attention. And problems or new ideas are often discovered very late in a design process, when they are difficult and costly to accommodate. It is not hard to understand the source of these difficulties. The crises of everyday life go on unabated during design and distract people from design, short-term politics continue, and many people are comfortable with what they already know. Many design team participants representing healthcare organizations want to reproduce their existing operation, even if they can recognize its flaws.

A healthcare design team is too often more like a raucous international meeting than like an effective task-oriented organization. Participants speak different professional languages, have different experiences, have different short-term objectives, hold different motivations for participating, and hold different values about what constitutes a successful project. The team may be far into a project before it understands the different viewpoints represented on the team.

A facility visit is a unique opportunity to address some of these problems. It provides an extended opportunity for a design or planning team to get together outside the pressures of daily life, to critically examine the operations of an excellent facility, to rethink its own ideas, and to build the basis of a team that may function for several years. It is often the longest uninterrupted time a team ever spends together, and the best chance to think in new ways.

A visit has three goals: to establish a situation for effective critical examination of state-of-the-art operations and facilities; to think about the project in new ways; and building a team. These goals are intertwined. A well-structured facility visit may help build a team more effectively than an artificial “feel-good” exercise of mountain climbing or simulated war games. A team that looks at a facility from different perspectives, and in which participants forcefully argue their viewpoint based on evidence from a common visit, can learn each other’s strengths, preferences, and priorities quickly and in a way that builds a bond that is closely related to their own project.

Many teams, however, do not provide enough structure for either critical examination or team building. Critical examination requires an understanding of what key issues are to be examined and how they might apply to the current design problem. Team building requires that a team clearly establishes the role of each team member, makes the resources, process, and schedule clear, is explicit about the form and use of the final report, and establishes a common language.

Healthcare designers and consultants can develop better facility visits, but the responsibility for improving this practice rests with healthcare clients. For a visit to reach its potential, clients must demand an improved process, hold the organizer accountable-and be willing to pay for it. The healthcare client must see design and planning as a process open to mutual learning, and make it happen.

APPENDIX A: BIBLIOGRAPHY

See PDF version for bibliography.

APPENDIX B: EXEMPLARY MICRO-CASES

See PDF version for micro-cases.

Copyright © 1994 by The Center for Health Design, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this work covered by the copyright herein may be reproduced by any means or used in any form without written permission of the publisher.

The views and methods expressed by the authors do not necessarily reflect the opinions of The Center for Health Design, or its Board, or staff.

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Report Writing: Field Visit

Field visits are a vital part of many professional and educational activities, offering firsthand exposure to real-world environments and situations. Writing a comprehensive report on a field visit can encapsulate the experience, detail observations, and convey insights gained from the outing.

Table of Contents

Understanding the purpose of a field visit report.

The field visit report serves several purposes:

• It documents the observations and experiences of the attendees.
• It serves as an educational tool for those who did not attend.
• It provides an empirical basis for analysis, discussion, and future planning.

Step 1: Pre-Visit Preparation

Objective Setting:

Before embarking on the field visit, it’s crucial to define the objectives of the visit. What are you hoping to learn or achieve? Clear goals will guide your focus and direct your note-taking.

Materials Required:

Equip yourself with a notebook or digital device for recording observations, a camera for taking photos (if permitted), and any relevant field guides or reference materials.

Background Research:

Gather preliminary information about the site. This might include historical context, prior studies, or data relevant to the visit’s objectives. Such knowledge provides a foundation upon which to build new observations.

Step 2: The Field Visit

Observation and Note-Taking:

During the field visit, engage actively with the environment. Take detailed notes on everything relevant to the visit’s objectives. Record sensory details, conversations, and your own reactions or questions that arise.

Photographic Evidence:

Take pictures to serve as visual evidence or to help jog your memory later. Ensure that photos are allowed and that you respect the privacy and intellectual property rights of those involved.

Interaction and Interviews:

If the visit involves interacting with locals or experts on-site, prepare some questions beforehand. Respectful and insightful queries can yield valuable information that enhances your report.

Step 3: Structuring the Field Visit Report

After the visit, begin drafting your report while the experience is fresh in your mind. A typical structure may include the following:

Title Page:

• Title of the report.
• Name and location of the site visited.
• Date of the visit.
• Names of the attendees, including the report’s author.

Table of Contents:

• A list of the main sections and sub-sections with page numbers.

Executive Summary or Abstract:

• A concise overview of the field visit and the main findings or observations.

Introduction:

• State the purpose and objectives of the visit.
• Provide background information about the site.

Methodology:

• Describe the methods used to gather information during the visit. This might include observation techniques, interviews, or surveys.

Observations and Findings:

• Detail the observations made during the visit.
• Present findings systematically, possibly divided by location or subject matter.
• Use subheadings to organize the content logically.

Analysis and Discussion:

• Analyze the data and observations from the visit.
• Discuss how the findings relate to the objectives of the visit.
• Compare observations with the background research where relevant.

Conclusion and Recommendations:

• Summarize the key outcomes of the visit.
• Offer any recommendations or suggest actions based on the visit’s findings.

Appendices:

• Include additional material such as interview transcripts, data sheets, or full-resolution photos.

References:

• Cite any sources referenced in the report.

Step 4: Writing the Field Visit Report

Drafting the Report:

• Start with the sections you feel most confident about, which is often the observations and findings.
• Use clear language and a formal tone appropriate for the report’s audience.
• Ensure that each section flows logically into the next.

Editing and Proofreading:

• Review your draft for clarity, coherence, and conciseness.
• Correct any grammatical errors and ensure consistency in formatting.
• Use headings, bullet points, and numbered lists to improve readability.

Incorporating Visual Elements:

• Add photos, diagrams, or maps to complement the text.
• Ensure visuals are clearly labeled and referenced in the report.

Step 5: Finalizing the Field Visit Report

Review and Feedback:

• If possible, have a peer or supervisor review the report and provide feedback.
• Use the feedback to refine and improve the report, ensuring it meets its objectives.

Citations and Ethical Considerations:

• Ensure that all sources are properly cited.
• If the field visit involved sensitive locations or subjects, make sure you’ve adhered to ethical standards in reporting.

Final Review:

• Conduct a final read-through to ensure the report is error-free and ready for submission.
• Verify that all information is correctly presented and that the report provides a clear and accurate account of the visit.

Submission or Distribution:

• Follow the guidelines provided by your institution or organization for submitting or distributing the report.
• Consider the format in which the report will be most accessible to your intended audience, whether that’s a printed document, a PDF, a slideshow presentation, or another format.

Additional Tips for Writing a Field Visit Report

• Prioritize Significance:  Focus on the most significant observations that relate directly to the objectives of the field visit.
• Be Objective:  Strive for objectivity in your report. Present facts before you interpret them.
• Stay Professional:  Maintain a professional tone throughout the report. Avoid colloquial language or personal anecdotes unless they serve a clear purpose.
• Reflective Insight:  Include a section reflecting on what you learned from the visit and how it could influence future work or studies.
• Keep It Engaging:  While professional and objective, the report should also engage the reader. Use descriptive language to bring your observations to life.

A well-crafted field visit report is more than a narrative; it’s a tool that encapsulates the experience, insights, and knowledge gained during the visit. By following these steps and dedicating time to careful observation and analysis, your report will serve as a valuable document for all stakeholders involved. Whether your visit is for academic, professional, or research purposes, a thorough report ensures that the benefits of the field visit extend far beyond the trip itself.

Field Visit Report Example

Title:  Field Visit Report on Urban Renewal Project Location:  Old Town District, Metro City Date of Visit:  January 15, 2024 Attendees:  Jane Smith (Urban Planner, Lead Author), Ray Gomez (Environmental Consultant), Lucy Wu (Architect) Prepared for:  Metro City Urban Renewal Committee Prepared by:  Urban Renewal Analysis Team, City Planning Department Submission Date:  February 5, 2024

Executive Summary

Introduction, objectives of the visit, methodology, infrastructure assessment, community impact, environmental considerations, analysis and discussion, conclusion and recommendations.

This report provides a comprehensive overview of the field visit conducted by the Urban Renewal Analysis Team to the Old Town District as part of Metro City’s urban renewal initiative. The visit aimed to evaluate the ongoing redevelopment efforts, understand community impact, and assess environmental considerations. Key findings demonstrate significant progress in infrastructure development and positive community engagement. However, there are concerns regarding the preservation of historical sites and the environmental sustainability of some new constructions. Recommendations address these concerns with a focus on sustainable practices and heritage conservation.

The Old Town District has been undergoing a significant urban renewal process aimed at revitalizing the area while preserving its historical significance. The Urban Renewal Committee commissioned a field visit to assess the progress and effectiveness of the redevelopment efforts.

The primary objectives of the visit were to:

• Evaluate the quality and pace of infrastructure development.
• Gauge the response of the local community to the redevelopment efforts.
• Assess the environmental sustainability of the projects.

The visit included walkthroughs of key redevelopment sites, structured interviews with project managers, informal discussions with local residents, and a review of environmental impact reports. The team took detailed notes and photographs to document the visit.

Observations and Findings

The redevelopment of the Old Town District included the refurbishment of roads, installation of modern utilities, and construction of new public spaces. The quality of work appeared to be high, with attention to details that preserve the district’s historical character.

Local businesses and residents expressed general satisfaction with the redevelopment. However, some concerns were raised about the potential for increased rent and cost of living due to gentrification.

Most new constructions are using green materials and technologies. Nevertheless, some projects lacked evident measures for energy efficiency and waste reduction.

The urban renewal project has made laudable strides in infrastructure and community engagement. Still, the potential for negative impacts, such as gentrification and insufficient environmental sustainability measures, needs to be addressed.

The field visit revealed that the Old Town District’s urban renewal project is on a positive trajectory but requires strategic adjustments:

• Sustainability Focus:  All new projects should incorporate comprehensive environmental sustainability plans.
• Heritage Conservation:  Development plans must include strategies to preserve the historical architecture and cultural identity of the district.
• Affordable Housing:  Implement policies to ensure that the local community can afford to stay in the district post-redevelopment.
• Community Involvement:  Continue to engage with local residents and businesses to ensure their needs and concerns are considered.
• Appendix A: Site Visit Photographs
• Appendix B: Interview Transcripts with Project Managers
• Appendix C: Community Feedback Forms
• Appendix D: Environmental Impact Assessment Reports
• City Planning Department. (2023). Urban Renewal Guidelines and Best Practices.
• Historical Preservation Society. (2024). Old Town District Heritage Report.
• Metro City Environmental Agency. (2023). Standards for Sustainable Urban Development.

This field visit report is a fictional example created for illustrative purposes and does not represent an actual event or project.

About Mr. Greg

Mr. Greg is an English teacher from Edinburgh, Scotland, currently based in Hong Kong. He has over 5 years teaching experience and recently completed his PGCE at the University of Essex Online. In 2013, he graduated from Edinburgh Napier University with a BEng(Hons) in Computing, with a focus on social media.

Mr. Greg’s English Cloud was created in 2020 during the pandemic, aiming to provide students and parents with resources to help facilitate their learning at home.

Whatsapp: +85259609792

[email protected]

tools4dev Practical tools for international development

Monitoring visit report template

The purpose of a monitoring visit (sometimes called a supervision visit or a field visit) is to make sure that project activities are implemented the way they are described in the plan. It normally involves meeting with the people running the project, meeting with the participants, and observing the activities.

At the end of a monitoring visit, it is important to prepare a report that describes what you found. These reports will document any discrepancies between the plan and actual implementation, as well as improvements made by the project team.

This monitoring visit report template is appropriate when:

• You need to report the results of a monitoring visit, supervision visit, or field visit.

This monitoring visit report template is NOT appropriate when:

• Your organisation or donor already has a standard template for monitoring visit reports (in which case use their template).

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Tags Monitoring & Evaluation

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How To Improve Your Facility Management With Healthcare Reports

Table of Contents

1) What Is Healthcare Reporting?

2) The Benefits Of A Healthcare Report

3) Types Of Reports In Healthcare

4) Healthcare Reports Examples

5) How To Create A Healthcare Report

6) Healthcare Reporting After COVID-19

Healthcare is one of the world’s most essential sectors. As a result of increasing demand in certain branches of care, driving down unnecessary expenditure while enhancing overall productivity is vital. Health institutions need to run on maximum efficiency across the board—in some cases, it’s literally a matter of life or death.

Despite this ominous message, we are living in the midst of a digital age. Rapid technological evolution means it’s now possible to use accessible and intuitive data-driven tools to our advantage.

For hospitals, hospices, homecare operators, and palliative care professionals looking to improve operational efficiency, producing and working with a healthcare report is the answer.

We’ve delved into the impact of big data in healthcare . Now, we’re going to consider the importance of reporting in healthcare.

Healthcare reports can help reduce errors, enhance the acquisition of vital data, reduce needless expenditure, and improve processes exponentially.

Like many of today’s most important industries, digital data, metrics, and KPIs (key performance indicators) are part of a bright and prosperous future - and a comprehensive report has the power to deliver in each of these critical areas.

Without further ado, let’s take a detailed look at the role of a report in healthcare.

What Is Healthcare Reporting?

Healthcare reports are a data-driven means of benchmarking the performance of specific processes or functions within a healthcare institution, with the primary aim of increasing efficiency, reducing errors, and optimizing metrics.

By utilizing interactive digital dashboards, it’s possible to leverage data to transform metrics into actionable insights to spot weaknesses, identify strengths, and predict events before they occur. This perfect storm of visual information ultimately makes institutions safer, more productive, and more intelligent.

In summary, healthcare analytics is critical to the ongoing success of any organization operating within this broad and invaluable sector.

To drive the message home: by leveraging a mix of advanced healthcare KPIs , insights, and online reporting tools , it's possible to not only obtain accurate facts that will benefit your organization, but this level of data can also lead to the discovery of fresh insights that can eliminate inefficiencies and achieve better health outcomes.

As a branch of business intelligence in the healthcare industry, reporting collects from the following five primary areas within the sector:

• Insights into claims and operational costs
• Metrics associated with pharmaceutical and research and development
• Clinical information gathered from continual care, electronic healthcare records (EHRs), and trials
• Important stats on patient behavior
• Predictive insights to create preventative strategies or initiatives to improve care and prescription processes in an ever-evolving landscape.

According to the World Health Organization, there is a one in 300 chance of a person being harmed due to a care-related administrative error. Comparatively, there’s a one-in-a-million chance of being harmed in an airplane incident. This discovery alone provides a direct answer to the question, ‘why is using a report important in healthcare?’ Without it, it’s unlikely healthcare institutions will ever reduce these figures to an acceptable level on a sustainable basis.

The Benefits Of A Healthcare Report

By tracking key healthcare data reporting insights and setting the right key performance indicators, your organization stands to benefit a great deal. Here are some notable examples and benefits  of using business intelligence in healthcare :

1. Improved management and decision making

The first benefit, and arguably one of the most important ones, is improved facility management and decision-making process. Armed with powerful insights coming from not only patient-related areas but also operational and financial areas, hospital managers can make informed decisions to ensure better clinical performance and correspondingly better outcomes.

With the help of a modern report and the right BI tools , managers can reduce costs while still ensuring a high level of service, predict demand for services and supplies, and prepare in case any unforeseen situations come up. The results are improved efficiency across the board.  

2. Preventative management

One of the most striking elements is the ability to harness the power of historical and current data to spot potentially fatal medical issues before they occur. This branch of predictive analytics in the care sector is pivotal to enhancing the quality of care and improving mortality rates.

To highlight the preventative purpose of a report in healthcare, 60% of healthcare leaders confirm their organization has adopted predictive analytics in recent times, and more will follow in the coming years. This is a testament to the essential role of predictive analytics in the sector.

3. Disease monitoring

Elaborating on our previous point, the predictive analytics and insights found in reports related to health can also help in placing surveillance on potentially large-scale disease outbreaks, again by using a mix of past and present metrics or insights to ensure that the correct course of action or preventative measures is taken to control or contain the situation.

4. Cutting down unnecessary costs

As mentioned, hospital reports can also make operations far more economically efficient. By collecting and analyzing operational metrics associated with your organization's daily expenditure in all primary areas from catering right through to patient medicine, analysts can help health institutions streamline their budgeting processes and make alterations or substitutions based on safety, ethics, and trust.

5. Diagnostic and therapeutic techniques

Earlier, we touched on a severe lack of accessible or timely information, as well as an alarming rate of administrative errors. Hospital analytics give organizations the power to amalgamate clinical, financial, and operational data that determines the efficiency of their various processes, as well as the state of their patients, and the productivity of their programs. By gaining access to these insights, an institution can gauge which processes aren't generating desired outcomes, significantly improve wellness programs, and ultimately, reduce readmission numbers.

Health specialist Kaiser Permanente, for example, leveraged healthcare reporting to assess, survey, and analyze patients that were at the biggest risk of a potential suicide attempt, discovering that the top 1% of individuals flagged were 200 times more likely to take their own life. This information proved invaluable in offering tailored therapy while taking all-important measures to reduce suicide rates.

Speaking on the subject , Gregory E. Simon, MD, MPH, a senior investigator at Kaiser Permanente, said:

“We demonstrated that we can use electronic health record data in combination with other tools to accurately identify people at high risk for suicide attempt or suicide death.”  

6. Patient wellbeing

A healthcare report can assist hospitals in offering information on an individual patient basis. By doing so, an institution can give individuals tailored advice on how they can maintain a healthy lifestyle based on their medical data and biometric vitals. Not only is this priceless to providing superior levels of aftercare, but again, it's also a giant leap in helping to reduce readmission rates.

Dynamic, real-time data can also provide alerts if someone is under your care and at risk of a potentially harmful or fatal event. Although this falls under the remit of predictive analytics, it’s worth mentioning here, as managing a person's health with consistency is essential to their well-being. Once they leave your institution, you can use this wealth of data-driven insight to provide a level of aftercare that offers the very best personal, physical, and mental well-being.

7. Practitioner performance

Reports can shed unbiased light on how your practitioners and staff are performing – an essential point on how management reporting can help improve the operation of the hospital.

With healthcare industry reports, it’s possible to accurately evaluate the performance, efficiency, and effectiveness of staff at the point of delivery. With sustainable performance evaluations, in addition, to reporting metrics related to patient wellness and satisfaction, you can leverage a performance dashboard to provide ongoing feedback on your practitioners, offering training and support where necessary.

Ultimately, this will improve satisfaction levels, reduce unwanted errors, and could even save lives.

8. Staffing strategy

Expanding on our previous point, in addition to evaluating practitioner performance with transparency, online data analysis can also help to identify any internal bottlenecks or inefficiencies that are proving costly to the institution while hindering care.

A valued and well-organized workforce is more than likely to perform consistently well while reaching or even exceeding its targets.

By setting clear-cut KPI benchmarks and monitoring trends, you will be able to see where you might need to redistribute or restructure departments and optimize your complete HR analytics strategy. This, in turn, will enhance the success of your institution.

9. Enhanced communication and operational efficiency

Last but not least, another great benefit is enhanced communication and operational efficiency. More than any other organization, a care facility employs many people who cover different functions. From attendings, residents, interns, nurses, and physical therapists, to rapid response teams and more, all of them need to stay connected to ensure the ultimate goal is achieved: excellent care for patients. 

A modern hospital report can help keep everyone on the same page regarding the performance of every relevant area. For instance, if a case needs the involvement of several specialists, all of them can access the data from one single location and get the information they need within seconds. This will not only improve internal communication but will also ensure operational efficiency in time. 

Types Of Reports In Healthcare

Just like any other industry, health facilities involve several departments and areas. For this reason, there is a need to generate various types of reports for each of these areas. Here we list some of the common ones.

• Nursing bedside shift : Hospitals have people running around at all times. This is especially true for nurses who need to take close care of patients and be informed of all new developments in their treatments. For this purpose, they use nursing reports. These healthcare reporting tools help nurses stay connected with any new developments or treatments that patients had during the previous shifts. The information presented here includes medical background, current situation, treatment, and care plan that's usually conducted behind closed doors. Through this, off-going and oncoming nurses can stay connected to ensure excellent care. 
• Medical reporting : Next in our types of reports in hospital care we have one that covers a person’s medical history in detail. It includes information about test results, images, treatments, medication history, hospitalizations, allergies, family history, among other things. They prove to be very useful when a person comes in for a consultation as it allows the doctor to get a full picture of the patient's health. In fact, having someone's health history can help professionals prevent certain diseases by spotting previous indicators. 
• Hospital management : Probably one of the most important types of reports in healthcare is the management one. This analysis tool allows managers to keep track of every relevant aspect related to facility performance. Here you find information about finances, costs, schedules, patient flow, and any other relevant data that will allow for the efficient functioning of the facility. With the help of modern technology, hospital managers can extract actionable insights to improve operational efficiency. 
• Public health : As its name suggests, this type is related to public services. It communicates research, reviews, and commentaries related to public health practice and methodology. Through this, decision-makers can assess the current situation of their country or city, develop new policies, and evaluate the current public care strategy.  Common information that can be extracted from these statements includes health disparities, tobacco use, disease surveillance, infectious and chronic diseases, and occupational disease, among others. 
• Medical device : This type is fundamental to ensure great care as well as stay compliant with FDA regulations. This organization receives several hundred thousand medical device statements of suspected device-associated deaths, serious injuries, and malfunctions. For this reason, hospitals need to closely monitor the performance of all devices to ensure both excellent care as well as compliance. This way any issues can be spotted before they happen. 

Healthcare Report Examples And Templates

At this stage of our journey, we’ve answered the question, ‘what is the importance of healthcare reporting?’ However, while you know the benefits of analytics in this industry, the best way to understand the value on a practical level is by exploring real-world examples.

That said when it comes to a report that yields results, there are a host of metrics or KPIs that can help improve the overall efficiency of your institution. Here we're going to explore the main areas of value:

1. Hospital KPI Dashboard

**click to enlarge**

While there is a wealth of data available to modern health providers and institutions, with so much generated from a number of different departments, specific key metrics can become fragmented, causing many important insights to remain unused or untapped.

For transparency, and efficiency, and to ensure every insight is used to its maximum potential, a centralized hospital KPI dashboard is the greatest ally in your quest for success.

Main KPIs :

• Treatment costs: An economic management-based KPI that helps providers calculate the amount of money an average patient costs.
• ER waiting time: The ER waiting time KPI measures the length of time a person arrives in the ER right through to the moment they see a physician. This metric needs to be monitored closely over time to identify trends and iron out any odd spikes in wait time.
• Patient wait time: The length of time a person has to wait for treatment or consultancy is a critical factor in their contentment levels. This KPI quantifies and displays the average length of time someone has to wait from registration to treatment. By reducing wait times, you stand to increase your satisfaction levels in a big way.

2. Patient Satisfaction Dashboard

The potential showcase of your facility, the satisfaction BI dashboard helps to translate the efforts you put in welcoming and treating individuals in addition to the degree of safety in which you carry out your services.

Insights of this nature can help significantly improve the safety of your practices as well as your levels of communication with the people passing in and out of your doors. Patient satisfaction is of vital importance, so it’s worth measuring.

• Patient satisfaction: A top priority for any organization, the satisfaction KPI provides a deeper look at overall satisfaction levels based on wait time, nutrition, care, and processes. A mix of feedback and valuable satisfaction-based metrics will help you make all important changes to your organization, helping you to improve satisfaction levels on a consistent basis.
• Patient safety: A pivotal component of the dashboard, this particular KPI provides a deeper understanding of your institution's capacity to deliver quality care to its patients, keeping them safe from contracting new infections, postoperative complications, or any form of sepsis.
• Patient waiting time: This will provide the same data and insights as the same KPI metric included in the hospital KPI dashboard.

3. Hospital Performance Dashboard

By leveraging the power of clear-cut targets and pre-defined outcomes, modern hospital performance reports like the one above offer the kind of visualizations that can significantly enhance all key areas of your institution.

From patient care right through to staff management, this template provides the information you need to ensure your institution is a sustainable success.

• Average stay: An overall measurement of the time spent, on average, by an individual admitted to your institution.
• Readmission rates: The readmission rate KPI offers insight into the number of persons that return to your institution shortly after being released. This KPI is particularly effective as it provides a gauge on the level of care that has been offered as well as how it can be enhanced.
• Costs by payer: An insight that evaluates the distribution of costs among various organisms, costs by payer assesses the providers that are covering the care of your patients. By understanding this metric, you can gain priceless insights into overall satisfaction as well as cost efficiencies.

4. Patient Dashboard

Next, in our rundown of real-world healthcare analytics examples, we arrive at our essential patient report.

This visually-cohesive melting pot of data offers a window of insight into key areas of care logistics, including bed occupancy rates, costs, and follow-up rates. This is an invaluable tool for busy departments such as geriatrics, gynecology, internal medicine, and pediatrics.

With this cutting-edge dashboard, no informational stone is left unturned. As such, this is an essential tool for swift, accurate decision-making as well as long-term strategic planning. It can foster efficiency and even save lives.

This patient report is designed to help you provide an exceptionally high standard of care across the board while responding to constant change - and when it comes to healthcare, that is priceless. Let’s dig a little deeper.

To put the power of this essential dashboard into perspective, let’s look at its primary KPIs:

• Bed occupancy rate: This trend-based KPI gives a clear indication of bed availability over specific timeframes. By monitoring this regularly, you will be able to balance availability across departments while reducing pressure on your institution.
• Equipment utilization: This essential visualization will show you which tools you’re utilizing the most to help you understand internal supply and demand on a deeper level.
• Patient drug cost per stay: This most striking of KPIs is invaluable for improving financial efficiency and growth on a long-term basis. It’s a brilliant tool for departmental funding allocation.

5. Hospital Network Dashboard 

Last but not least, we have an example that tracks the financial and patient-related performance of a private hospital network that has multiple facilities such as long-term care clinics, clinical labs, and hospices, just to name a few. The KPIs provided in this healthcare financial reporting template offer a detailed view that enables decision-makers to inform their strategies and ensure efficient operations. 

The financial aspect of a private care facility is just as important as the patient-care aspect. In the end, without an efficient financial plan, the facility would not be able to provide quality care for patients. Therefore, generating a report that offers a mix of operational and financial indicators can prove valuable to identify areas of improvement and ensure resources are being allocated and spent appropriately. 

The template above offers a dynamic way of looking at important KPIs by comparing them to the previous period and showing a target. This way, users are able to quickly identify at-a-glance if there is an area that is underperforming. 

That being said, let’s explore some of the KPIs listed here in more detail. 

• Operating cash flow & Net profit margin: The operating cash flow tracks the cash generated by the facility’s normal operations. On the other hand, the net profit margin shows how much cash the facility has after all expenses have been subtracted. Comparing both indicators can provide insights into the financial performance of the facility. 
• Treatment error rate: As its name suggests, this indicator tracks the percentage of mistakes made by the clinical staff when providing any kind of treatment to a patient. This can be the wrong medication, diagnosis, or treatment just to name a few. 
• Patient mortality rate : This metric tracks the percentage of patients that die during their admission at a hospital. It is often calculated by segments such as patients in critical care, high-mortality diseases, or older ones. Naturally, this ratio should be kept as low as possible. 

How To Create An Efficient Hospital Report

Now that we’ve covered the main benefits and a list of useful examples. It is time to start thinking about generating your own healthcare report format. Here we list important steps that will put you on the right track to perform successful analytics. 

1. Define your facility’s needs 

The first step to building any kind of report in health is to think about your goals and needs. On one hand, your goals might be linked to improving the performance of certain areas such as ER response time, readmission rates, lowering costs, or others. On the other hand, your needs might include a better monitoring system for shifts, operations, and finances. Each of these goals and needs will vary in different facilities, defining them carefully is a critical step as it will map your process forward.

2. Consider the full picture

Moving on with our hospital reporting requirements, with your goals in hand, you need to start collecting your data. Medical data sources can involve anything from patient records, bed occupancy, material usage, and many others depending on the scope of your report. Here, it is important to also consider how external factors might affect the context of your data. For instance, if you are generating a report to understand patient volumes in different periods, you need to consider social determinants. Which can be conditions in which patients live, economic policies, and social and political norms, among others. Having the full picture will enable you to tell an accurate story and make informed decisions to improve the level of care. 

3. Select relevant KPIs and metrics 

Once you’ve defined your main needs and goals and gathered the necessary data, it is time to choose the KPIs and metrics that will help you measure your efforts. There are a wide variety of metrics that can be tracked coming from patient experience, operational processes, finances, general management, and more. However, not all of them will help you track your goals, and using too many KPIs can end up misleading your analysis. The important thing is that you keep it focused on your goals and needs and you can do that with the help of a modern KPI tool .

4. Make sure you are compliant 

Trust between patients and organizations providing care is fundamental. When reaching out for medical help, individuals provide sensitive information about their life that they might want to keep private. Common privacy concerns in the health industry include organizations sharing data with family members, pharmaceutical companies, or other providers without consent. If someone is sure its information will stay private, he or she will most likely seek treatment for a disease. 

For this reason, privacy and compliance should be a factor to consider. There are various regulations that govern the privacy of patient data, and organizations need to follow them to avoid penalties and fines. One of them is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act ( HIPAA ). The HIPAA aims to strike a balance that allows for the use of important data while protecting the rights of the individuals seeking care.  Its main goal is “to ensure that individual’s health information is properly protected while allowing the flow of health information needed to provide and promote high-quality health care and to protect the public’s health and well-being”.

5. Select an efficient report format

In healthcare, maybe more than in any other industry, the need for an efficient reporting process is critical as any mistakes can affect the caregiving process. One of the points to consider is the format in which your reports will be viewed and shared. In a hospital’s daily work environment there are people running around everywhere, and having the capacity to access critical data on the go is an invaluable benefit. 

We have already shown you a list of interactive dashboard examples that display insights in real-time. These examples were created with a modern dashboard creator that allows you to access your report from any type of smart device. For example, a nurse might need to access relevant patient data from an iPad when doing morning rounds. A doctor might need urgent access to data from his or her phone when being outside of the clinic. Taking this into consideration, providing flexible report formats is a must. 

6. Invest in healthcare analytics software

Healthcare and analytics are more connected than ever. This is because analytical tools have helped health professionals and organizations to identify trends, predict future outcomes, and extract insights to improve their performance not only on a clinical level but also on an operational and financial level. 

With all this in mind, choosing the right healthcare reporting software is a critical step in the process. There are many BI reporting tools available in the market that offer various features to take your data analysis to the next level. The important tip when picking which tool to invest in is to keep in mind your facility’s needs. For example, providing multiple report formats, sharing options, ease of use, advanced technologies such as predictive analytics, and data visualization options, among others. 

7. Benefit from AI and predictive analytics 

The need for up-to-date insights is becoming increasingly important, especially in the healthcare industry where managers and decision-makers need to be informed about any latest developments. That is possible thanks to advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence and predictive analytics.

BI reporting tools such as datapine provide users with professional data alerts that are powered by artificial intelligence. These alerts notify users every time a goal or predefined target is met to keep them informed about any important developments. Likewise, datapine’s predictive analytics tool enables users to generate accurate forecasts to plan for future scenarios. For example, a hospital might use predictive analytics to generate a report about the patient volume during the winter, considering historical data about diseases and other factors from that particular period. 

Technologies like these take the reporting process to the next level by providing more than just visual access to data but the possibility to navigate through it and extract valuable conclusions. Therefore, considering them in your report-generation process can prove extremely valuable. 

8. Learn from the process and keep evolving 

So, you generated your reports and extracted actionable insights that will allow you to improve patient care to the fullest. But, that is not all. Reporting is a never-ending process that needs constant assessment and reevaluation to make sure you are going on the right track. After you generated your reports you need to constantly go back and find improvement opportunities to make the process more efficient every time. Plus, the data and external conditions are constantly changing, therefore, you need to rethink your strategies taking those elements into consideration. Doing so will ensure you are using the most up-to-date and accurate insights to provide the best care possible and ensure your facility is running smoothly. 

How COVID-19 Impacted Healthcare Analytics & Reporting Today

Data analytics played a huge role during the COVID-19 pandemic. Not only did it help healthcare professionals track hospital capacity as well as predict the severity of the disease and how fast it would spread, but it also allowed the population to be informed about the number of cases and deaths as well as the overall spread worldwide.

According to a report by Business Wire, the global market for healthcare descriptive analytics was estimated at $15.6 billion in 2020 and, amid the pandemic crisis, it is expected to grow up to $70.2 billion in 2027 with a CAGR of 23.9% during those years. 

Now, data analytics has always been an important part of the healthcare industry, especially when it comes to research. However, as this report shows, the scope for analytics in healthcare has clearly expanded due to the pandemic. In fact, at the beginning of the outbreak in 2020, many health organizations realized that their IT systems and technologies were not prepared to face the circumstances. Leading to fast development and implementation of multiple AI and data-driven initiatives that will be valuable beyond the pandemic.

One of the technologies that prove particularly useful was predictive analytics. With several medical research centers developing predictive models to forecast the severity of the virus, the risk of mortality of an individual, how likely a person is to test positive, and the rate at which the virus could spread, among other things. All of these advancements can help health professionals take preventive measures such as predicting the spread of the virus or preparing their staff, equipment, and resources for high-spread periods. Something that can also be replicated in other common seasonal diseases. 

Likewise, with the help of predictive models, hospitals were able to generate reports to track in real-time the availability of beds, ventilators, drugs, and others to be fully aware of their resources and capacity. Another practice that can be extremely valuable for a hospital's regular operations. 

Just like the examples we just described, the use of data analytics, artificial intelligence, and machine learning played a pivotal role in the way the health industry dealt with the pandemic. In the end, we can conclude that COVID-19 helped put the value of data analytics for hospital reporting systems into perspective. Today, more health organizations that didn’t work with data for their daily operations are investing in analytics to improve patient care and discover new innovative treatments. 

That being said, to do so efficiently, they will need to rely on the right technologies and functionalities that will help them manage their data in an efficient yet secure way. Modern healthcare analytics software such as datapine provides a private and secure environment to manage a range of healthcare data sources in a way that is intuitive and productive. 

Conclusion & Key Takeaways

The wealth of health data available in today’s digital world means that integral institutions like yours no longer have to shoot in the dark or make potentially costly estimations to improve care and make vital decisions when they matter most.

Now, you can make informed choices about how your organization is run while responding to issues or emergencies in real time with transparency, confidence, and diligence. The age of information is here, and there’s no going back.

Healthcare is one of the world's most invaluable services - you simply cannot put a price on health and well-being. By working the right metrics from the right places and understanding how to transform insight into action, you will improve the lives of your staff and patients while gaining the ability to respond to constant change. You will make your institution better, make a difference, and continue to provide a service you can be proud of.

To discover more about how we can help your institution thrive, explore our dedicated healthcare analytics page or connect with us . You can also try our 14-day free trial !

We look forward to helping you take those first steps toward digital enlightenment.

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Policy, Guidelines & Field Visit Reports

Policy and guidelines, field visit reports.

Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Assignments

• Annotated Bibliography
• Analyzing a Scholarly Journal Article
• Group Presentations
• Dealing with Nervousness
• Using Visual Aids
• Grading Someone Else's Paper
• Types of Structured Group Activities
• Group Project Survival Skills
• Leading a Class Discussion
• Multiple Book Review Essay
• Reviewing Collected Works
• Writing a Case Analysis Paper
• Writing a Case Study
• About Informed Consent
• Writing Field Notes
• Writing a Policy Memo
• Writing a Reflective Paper
• Writing a Research Proposal
• Generative AI and Writing
• Acknowledgments

The purpose of a field report in the social sciences is to describe the deliberate observation of people, places, and/or events and to analyze what has been observed in order to identify and categorize common themes in relation to the research problem underpinning the study. The content represents the researcher's interpretation of meaning found in data that has been gathered during one or more observational events.

Flick, Uwe. The SAGE Handbook of Qualitative Data Collection . London: SAGE Publications, 2018; Lofland, John, David Snow, Leon Anderson, and Lyn H. Lofland. Analyzing Social Settings: A Guide to Qualitative Observation and Analysis. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, 2022; Baker, Lynda. "Observation: A Complex Research Method." Library Trends 55 (Summer 2006): 171-189.; Kellehear, Allan. The Unobtrusive Researcher: A Guide to Methods . New York: Routledge, 2020.

How to Approach Writing a Field Report

How to Begin

Field reports are most often assigned in disciplines of the applied social sciences [e.g., social work, anthropology, gerontology, criminal justice, education, law, the health care services] where it is important to build a bridge of relevancy between the theoretical concepts learned in the classroom and the practice of actually doing the work you are being taught to do. Field reports are also common in certain science disciplines [e.g., geology] but these reports are organized differently and serve a different purpose than what is described below.

Professors will assign a field report with the intention of improving your understanding of key theoretical concepts by applying methods of careful and structured observation of, and reflection about, people, places, or phenomena existing in their natural settings. Field reports facilitate the development of data collection techniques and observation skills and they help you to understand how theory applies to real world situations. Field reports are also an opportunity to obtain evidence through methods of observing professional practice that contribute to or challenge existing theories.

We are all observers of people, their interactions, places, and events; however, your responsibility when writing a field report is to conduct research based on data generated by the act of designing a specific study, deliberate observation, synthesis of key findings, and interpretation of their meaning.

When writing a field report you need to:

• Systematically observe and accurately record the varying aspects of a situation . Always approach your field study with a detailed protocol about what you will observe, where you should conduct your observations, and the method by which you will collect and record your data.
• Continuously analyze your observations . Always look for the meaning underlying the actions you observe. Ask yourself: What's going on here? What does this observed activity mean? What else does this relate to? Note that this is an on-going process of reflection and analysis taking place for the duration of your field research.
• Keep the report’s aims in mind while you are observing . Recording what you observe should not be done randomly or haphazardly; you must be focused and pay attention to details. Enter the observation site [i.e., "field"] with a clear plan about what you are intending to observe and record in relation to the research problem while, at the same time, being prepared to adapt to changing circumstances as they may arise.
• Consciously observe, record, and analyze what you hear and see in the context of a theoretical framework . This is what separates data gatherings from reporting. The theoretical framework guiding your field research should determine what, when, and how you observe and act as the foundation from which you interpret your findings in relation to the underlying assumptions embedded in the theoretical framework .

Techniques to Record Your Observations Although there is no limit to the type of data gathering techniques you can use, these are the most frequently used methods:

Note Taking This is the most common and easiest method of recording your observations. Tips for taking notes include: organizing some shorthand symbols beforehand so that recording basic or repeated actions does not impede your ability to observe, using many small paragraphs, which reflect changes in activities, who is talking, etc., and, leaving space on the page so you can write down additional thoughts and ideas about what’s being observed, any theoretical insights, and notes to yourself that are set aside for further investigation. See drop-down tab for additional information about note-taking.

Photography With the advent of smart phones, an almost unlimited number of high quality photographs can be taken of the objects, events, and people observed during a field study. Photographs can help capture an important moment in time as well as document details about the space where your observation takes place. Taking a photograph can save you time in documenting the details of a space that would otherwise require extensive note taking. However, be aware that flash photography could undermine your ability to observe unobtrusively so assess the lighting in your observation space; if it's too dark, you may need to rely on taking notes. Also, you should reject the idea that photographs represent some sort of "window into the world" because this assumption creates the risk of over-interpreting what they show. As with any product of data gathering, you are the sole instrument of interpretation and meaning-making, not the object itself. Video and Audio Recordings Video or audio recording your observations has the positive effect of giving you an unfiltered record of the observation event. It also facilitates repeated analysis of your observations. This can be particularly helpful as you gather additional information or insights during your research. However, these techniques have the negative effect of increasing how intrusive you are as an observer and will often not be practical or even allowed under certain circumstances [e.g., interaction between a doctor and a patient] and in certain organizational settings [e.g., a courtroom]. Illustrations/Drawings This does not refer to an artistic endeavor but, rather, refers to the possible need, for example, to draw a map of the observation setting or illustrating objects in relation to people's behavior. This can also take the form of rough tables, charts, or graphs documenting the frequency and type of activities observed. These can be subsequently placed in a more readable format when you write your field report. To save time, draft a table [i.e., columns and rows] on a separate piece of paper before an observation if you know you will be entering data in that way.

NOTE:   You may consider using a laptop or other electronic device to record your notes as you observe, but keep in mind the possibility that the clicking of keys while you type or noises from your device can be obtrusive, whereas writing your notes on paper is relatively quiet and unobtrusive. Always assess your presence in the setting where you're gathering the data so as to minimize your impact on the subject or phenomenon being studied.

ANOTHER NOTE:   Techniques of deliberate observation and data gathering are not innate skills; they are skills that must be learned and practiced in order to achieve proficiency. Before your first observation, practice the technique you plan to use in a setting similar to your study site [e.g., take notes about how people choose to enter checkout lines at a grocery store if your research involves examining the choice patterns of unrelated people forced to queue in busy social settings]. When the act of data gathering counts, you'll be glad you practiced beforehand.

YET ANOTHER NOTE:   An issue rarely discussed in the literature about conducting field research is whether you should move around the study site while observing or remaining situated in one place. Moving around can be intrusive, but it facilitates observing people's behavior from multiple vectors. However, if you remain in one place throughout the observation [or during each observation], you will eventually blend into the background and diminish the chance of unintentionally influencing people's behavior. If the site has a complex set of interactions or interdependent activities [e.g., a play ground], consider moving around; if the study site is relatively fixed [e.g., a classroom], then consider staying in one place while observing.

Examples of Things to Document While Observing

• Physical setting . The characteristics of an occupied space and the human use of the place where the observation(s) are being conducted.
• Objects and material culture . This refers to the presence, placement, and arrangement of objects that impact the behavior or actions of those being observed. If applicable, describe the cultural artifacts representing the beliefs [i.e., the values, ideas, attitudes, and assumptions] of the individuals you are observing [e.g., the choice of particular types of clothing in the observation of family gatherings during culturally specific holidays].
• Use of language . Don't just observe but  listen to what is being said, how is it being said, and the tone of conversations among participants.
• Behavior cycles . This refers to documenting when and who performs what behavior or task and how often they occur. Record at which stage this behavior is occurring within the setting.
• The order in which events unfold . Note sequential patterns of behavior or the moment when actions or events take place and their significance. Also, be prepared to note moments that diverge from these sequential patterns of behavior or actions.
• Physical characteristics of subjects. If relevant, document personal characteristics of individuals being observed. Note that, unless this data can be verified in interviews or from documentary evidence, you should only focus on characteristics that can be clearly observed [e.g., clothing, physical appearance, body language].
• Expressive body movements . This would include things like body posture or facial expressions. Note that it may be relevant to also assess whether expressive body movements support or contradict the language used in conversation [e.g., detecting sarcasm].

Brief notes about all of these examples contextualize your observations; however, your observation notes will be guided primarily by your theoretical framework, keeping in mind that your observations will feed into and potentially modify or alter these frameworks.

Sampling Techniques

Sampling refers to the process used to select a portion of the population for study . Qualitative research, of which observation is one method of data gathering, is generally based on non-probability and purposive sampling rather than probability or random approaches characteristic of quantitatively-driven studies. Sampling in observational research is flexible and often continues until no new themes emerge from the data, a point referred to as data saturation.

All sampling decisions are made for the explicit purpose of obtaining the richest possible source of information to answer the research questions. Decisions about sampling assumes you know what you want to observe, what behaviors are important to record, and what research problem you are addressing before you begin the study. These questions determine what sampling technique you should use, so be sure you have adequately answered them before selecting a sampling method.

Ways to sample when conducting an observation include:

• Ad Libitum Sampling -- this approach is not that different from what people do at the zoo; they observe whatever seems interesting at the moment. There is no organized system of recording the observations; you just note whatever seems relevant at the time. The advantage of this method is that you are often able to observe relatively rare or unusual behaviors that might be missed by more deliberately designed sampling methods. This method is also useful for obtaining preliminary observations that can be used to develop your final field study. Problems using this method include the possibility of inherent bias toward conspicuous behaviors or individuals, thereby missing mundane or repeated patterns of behavior, and that you may miss brief interactions in social settings.
• Behavior Sampling -- this involves watching the entire group of subjects and recording each occurrence of a specific behavior of interest and with reference to which individuals were involved. The method is useful in recording rare behaviors missed by other sampling methods and is often used in conjunction with focal or scan methods [see below]. However, sampling can be biased towards particular conspicuous behaviors.
• Continuous Recording -- provides a faithful record of behavior including frequencies, durations, and latencies [the time that elapses between a stimulus and the response to it]. This is a very demanding method because you are trying to record everything within the setting and, thus, measuring reliability may be sacrificed. In addition, durations and latencies are only reliable if subjects remain present throughout the collection of data. However, this method facilitates analyzing sequences of behaviors and ensures obtaining a wealth of data about the observation site and the people within it. The use of audio or video recording is most useful with this type of sampling.
• Focal Sampling -- this involves observing one individual for a specified amount of time and recording all instances of that individual's behavior. Usually you have a set of predetermined categories or types of behaviors that you are interested in observing [e.g., when a teacher walks around the classroom] and you keep track of the duration of those behaviors. This approach doesn't tend to bias one behavior over another and provides significant detail about a individual's behavior. However, with this method, you likely have to conduct a lot of focal samples before you have a good idea about how group members interact. It can also be difficult within certain settings to keep one individual in sight for the entire period of the observation without being intrusive.
• Instantaneous Sampling -- this is where observation sessions are divided into short intervals divided by sample points. At each sample point the observer records if predetermined behaviors of interest are taking place. This method is not effective for recording discrete events of short duration and, frequently, observers will want to record novel behaviors that occur slightly before or after the point of sampling, creating a sampling error. Though not exact, this method does give you an idea of durations and is relatively easy to do. It is also good for recording behavior patterns occurring at a specific instant, such as, movement or body positions.
• One-Zero Sampling -- this is very similar to instantaneous sampling, only the observer records if the behaviors of interest have occurred at any time during an interval instead of at the instant of the sampling point. The method is useful for capturing data on behavior patterns that start and stop repeatedly and rapidly, but that last only for a brief period of time. The disadvantage of this approach is that you get a dimensionless score for an entire recording session, so you only get one one data point for each recording session.
• Scan Sampling -- this method involves taking a census of the entire observed group at predetermined time periods and recording what each individual is doing at that moment. This is useful for obtaining group behavioral data and allows for data that are evenly representative across individuals and periods of time. On the other hand, this method may be biased towards more conspicuous behaviors and you may miss a lot of what is going on between observations, especially rare or unusual behaviors. It is also difficult to record more than a few individuals in a group setting without missing what each individual is doing at each predetermined moment in time [e.g., children sitting at a table during lunch at school]. The use of audio or video recording is useful with this type of sampling.

Alderks, Peter. Data Collection. Psychology 330 Course Documents. Animal Behavior Lab. University of Washington; Emerson, Robert M. Contemporary Field Research: Perspectives and Formulations . 2nd ed. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 2001; Emerson, Robert M. et al. “Participant Observation and Fieldnotes.” In Handbook of Ethnography . Paul Atkinson et al., eds. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2001), 352-368; Emerson, Robert M. et al. Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes . 2nd ed. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011; Ethnography, Observational Research, and Narrative Inquiry. Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Hazel, Spencer. "The Paradox from Within: Research Participants Doing-Being-Observed." Qualitative Research 16 (August 2016): 446-457; Pace, Tonio. Writing Field Reports. Scribd Online Library; Presser, Jon and Dona Schwartz. “Photographs within the Sociological Research Process.” In Image-based Research: A Sourcebook for Qualitative Researchers . Jon Prosser, editor (London: Falmer Press, 1998), pp. 115-130; Pyrczak, Fred and Randall R. Bruce. Writing Empirical Research Reports: A Basic Guide for Students of the Social and Behavioral Sciences . 5th ed. Glendale, CA: Pyrczak Publishing, 2005; Report Writing. UniLearning. University of Wollongong, Australia; Wolfinger, Nicholas H. "On Writing Fieldnotes: Collection Strategies and Background Expectancies.” Qualitative Research 2 (April 2002): 85-95; Writing Reports. Anonymous. The Higher Education Academy.

Structure and Writing Style

How you choose to format your field report is determined by the research problem, the theoretical framework that is driving your analysis, the observations that you make, and/or specific guidelines established by your professor. Since field reports do not have a standard format, it is worthwhile to determine from your professor what the preferred structure and organization should be before you begin to write. Note that field reports should be written in the past tense. With this in mind, most field reports in the social sciences include the following elements:

I.  Introduction The introduction should describe the research problem, the specific objectives of your research, and the important theories or concepts underpinning your field study. The introduction should describe the nature of the organization or setting where you are conducting the observation, what type of observations you have conducted, what your focus was, when you observed, and the methods you used for collecting the data. Collectively, this descriptive information should support reasons why you chose the observation site and the people or events within it. You should also include a review of pertinent literature related to the research problem, particularly if similar methods were used in prior studies. Conclude your introduction with a statement about how the rest of the paper is organized.

II.  Description of Activities

Your readers only knowledge and understanding of what happened will come from the description section of your report because they were not witnesses to the situation, people, or events that you are writing about. Given this, it is crucial that you provide sufficient details to place the analysis that will follow into proper context; don't make the mistake of providing a description without context. The description section of a field report is similar to a well written piece of journalism. Therefore, a useful approach to systematically describing the varying aspects of an observed situation is to answer the "Five W’s of Investigative Reporting." As Dubbels notes [p. 19], these are:

• What -- describe what you observed. Note the temporal, physical, and social boundaries you imposed to limit the observations you made. What were your general impressions of the situation you were observing. For example, as a student teacher, what is your impression of the application of iPads as a learning device in a history class; as a cultural anthropologist, what is your impression of women's participation in a Native American religious ritual?
• Where -- provide background information about the setting of your observation and, if necessary, note important material objects that are present that help contextualize the observation [e.g., arrangement of computers in relation to student engagement with the teacher].
• When -- record factual data about the day and the beginning and ending time of each observation. Note that it may also be necessary to include background information or key events which impact upon the situation you were observing [e.g., observing the ability of teachers to re-engage students after coming back from an unannounced fire drill].
• Who -- note background and demographic information about the individuals being observed e.g., age, gender, ethnicity, and/or any other variables relevant to your study]. Record who is doing what and saying what, as well as, who is not doing or saying what. If relevant, be sure to record who was missing from the observation.
• Why -- why were you doing this? Describe the reasons for selecting particular situations to observe. Note why something happened. Also note why you may have included or excluded certain information.

III.  Interpretation and Analysis

Always place the analysis and interpretations of your field observations within the larger context of the theoretical assumptions and issues you described in the introduction. Part of your responsibility in analyzing the data is to determine which observations are worthy of comment and interpretation, and which observations are more general in nature. It is your theoretical framework that allows you to make these decisions. You need to demonstrate to the reader that you are conducting the field work through the eyes of an informed viewer and from the perspective of a casual observer.

Here are some questions to ask yourself when analyzing your observations:

• What is the meaning of what you have observed?
• Why do you think what you observed happened? What evidence do you have for your reasoning?
• What events or behaviors were typical or widespread? If appropriate, what was unusual or out of the ordinary? How were they distributed among categories of people?
• Do you see any connections or patterns in what you observed?
• Why did the people you observed proceed with an action in the way that they did? What are the implications of this?
• Did the stated or implicit objectives of what you were observing match what was achieved?
• What were the relative merits of the behaviors you observed?
• What were the strengths and weaknesses of the observations you recorded?
• Do you see connections between what you observed and the findings of similar studies identified from your review of the literature?
• How do your observations fit into the larger context of professional practice? In what ways have your observations possibly changed or affirmed your perceptions of professional practice?
• Have you learned anything from what you observed?

NOTE:   Only base your interpretations on what you have actually observed. Do not speculate or manipulate your observational data to fit into your study's theoretical framework.

IV.  Conclusion and Recommendations

The conclusion should briefly recap of the entire study, reiterating the importance or significance of your observations. Avoid including any new information. You should also state any recommendations you may have based on the results of your study. Be sure to describe any unanticipated problems you encountered and note the limitations of your study. The conclusion should not be more than two or three paragraphs.

V.  Appendix

This is where you would place information that is not essential to explaining your findings, but that supports your analysis [especially repetitive or lengthy information], that validates your conclusions, or that contextualizes a related point that helps the reader understand the overall report. Examples of information that could be included in an appendix are figures/tables/charts/graphs of results, statistics, pictures, maps, drawings, or, if applicable, transcripts of interviews. There is no limit to what can be included in the appendix or its format [e.g., a DVD recording of the observation site], provided that it is relevant to the study's purpose and reference is made to it in the report. If information is placed in more than one appendix ["appendices"], the order in which they are organized is dictated by the order they were first mentioned in the text of the report.

VI.  References

List all sources that you consulted and obtained information from while writing your field report. Note that field reports generally do not include further readings or an extended bibliography. However, consult with your professor concerning what your list of sources should be included and be sure to write them in the preferred citation style of your discipline or is preferred by your professor [i.e., APA, Chicago, MLA, etc.].

Alderks, Peter. Data Collection. Psychology 330 Course Documents. Animal Behavior Lab. University of Washington; Dubbels, Brock R. Exploring the Cognitive, Social, Cultural, and Psychological Aspects of Gaming and Simulations . Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 2018; Emerson, Robert M. Contemporary Field Research: Perspectives and Formulations . 2nd ed. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 2001; Emerson, Robert M. et al. “Participant Observation and Fieldnotes.” In Handbook of Ethnography . Paul Atkinson et al., eds. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2001), 352-368; Emerson, Robert M. et al. Writing Ethnographic Fieldnotes . 2nd ed. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2011; Ethnography, Observational Research, and Narrative Inquiry. Writing@CSU. Colorado State University; Pace, Tonio. Writing Field Reports. Scribd Online Library; Pyrczak, Fred and Randall R. Bruce. Writing Empirical Research Reports: A Basic Guide for Students of the Social and Behavioral Sciences . 5th ed. Glendale, CA: Pyrczak Publishing, 2005; Report Writing. UniLearning. University of Wollongong, Australia; Wolfinger, Nicholas H. "On Writing Fieldnotes: Collection Strategies and Background Expectancies.” Qualitative Research 2 (April 2002): 85-95; Writing Reports. Anonymous. The Higher Education Academy.

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Report: Financial assistance to patients dips at some CT hospitals

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Hospitals with non-profit status receive major financial benefits from the federal and state governments, including relief from income, sales and property taxes. In return, they must provide what’s known as “community benefit.” 

But a new report raises questions about whether some hospitals are providing enough.

Community benefits can come in several forms, including providing free and discounted care, accepting patients on Medicaid, conducting research and training health professionals. But it can also include spending on community services that address social determinants of health, like housing and food access.

According to the draft report published this week by the Office of Health Strategy, Connecticut’s non-profit hospital community benefit spending increased slightly from $1.6 billion in 2017 to $1.8 billion in 2022. However, the amount that non-profit hospitals spent on community benefits as a share of total expenses dropped from 15.8% to 11.8%.

When asked about the figures, Nicole Rall, a spokesperson for the Connecticut Hospital Association, said that hospitals have increased community benefit spending at a time when their costs have soared. 

“The real story here is that hospitals grew their investments even as they faced unprecedented cost growth and during years when many hospitals had negative operating margins,” said Rall in emailed statements. 

Tiffany Donelson, president and CEO of Connecticut Health Foundation, said that while she finds the overall numbers disheartening, the report marks the most detailed insight into community benefit spending in the state. 

“We’ve never had an opportunity to really look at and to think about community benefit dollars in this holistic way,” she said. [The Connecticut Health Foundation is a funder of The Connecticut Mirror.]

Among the key findings, the study’s authors noted that community benefit reporting lacks transparency and standardization, making it difficult to provide consistently accurate comparisons across facilities.

Charity care

The report revealed that free and discounted care provided by hospitals to income-eligible patients — known as charity care — decreased by 25%, or nearly $90 million, from $343 million in 2017 to $256 million in 2022. 

“The decline in charity care is notable as it is the most historic community benefit, and a direct benefit people obtain from nonprofit hospitals that are organized and operated for a charitable purpose,” wrote the report’s authors. While conducting research or providing training programs for health professionals can absolutely provide indirect benefits, the impact of charity care is more concrete for patients. 

“Medical bills are inundating over 280,000 Connecticut residents. Charity care is that bridge, that support, because our health care system is one of the most expensive in the world,” said Kally Moquete, senior manager of policy at Health Equity Solutions.

There are multiple potential explanations for the decline. The report’s authors note that federal public health emergency funding, expanded COVID-era Medicaid eligibility and a decrease in hospital utilization during the pandemic all could have contributed to a decreased demand for charity care dollars. The CHA spokesperson also noted that enrollment in the state’s exchange has continued to grow. 

But the report also noted that the decrease in charity care has been accompanied by an increase in bad debt, which represents “the services for which a tax-exempt hospital anticipated but did not receive payment” and can result in medical debt for individuals. Even if hospitals write off bad debt, they can still sell it to collections agencies or report it to credit bureaus. 

Between 2016 and 2022, about $100 million of bad debt was attributable to individuals who would have qualified for charity care. But it’s unknown why those individuals didn’t receive financial assistance. For example, the services they used may have been exempt from the hospital’s charity care policy, or the patients may have not applied.

Rall, the spokesperson with CHA, attributes the increase in bad debt to the proliferation of high-deductible plans that leave patients underinsured. She stated the problem should be addressed by “tackling misleading and insufficient insurance coverage.”

Elisa Neira-Hamada, the senior director of health equity at OHS, said that ensuring access to charity care for those who qualify can help alleviate devastating financial pressures of receiving medical care, which disproportionately impacts Black and Latino, low-income, disabled and uninsured residents. 

“For many residents, understanding how to apply for assistance can be a challenge, let alone during a time when they are sick and may need emergency care. Strengthening access to financial assistance can directly impact health outcomes and eliminate significant financial burdens,” said Neira-Hamada in emailed comments.

In 2022, Yale New Haven Health spent the most on charity care among large Connecticut hospital systems, both in terms of total dollars and as a percentage of expenses. But the system also saw the most drastic decrease in charity care spending when compared to 2021, with a nearly $50 million reduction.

"We are proud to have the most generous financial assistance policies in the state," said Mark D'Antonio, a spokesperson for Yale New Haven Health. "The exact amount of our charity care spending varies year over year due to external factors such as volume and demand, but we consistently boast multiple programs designed to provide low-income patients and families with the resources and financial assistance they may need."

Trinity Health of New England spent the least on charity care as a percent of total expenses when comparing the major health systems. The system’s eligibility threshold — 200% of the Federal Poverty Level — for free care is the lowest of the non-profit hospitals in the state and equal to the eligibility standard at Waterbury, one of the state’s for-profit hospitals. Middlesex Hospital, which is independent, also has an eligibility threshold of 200% of FPL. 

For discounted care, nearly all the state’s non-profit hospitals have an eligibility threshold equal to the state’s for-profit hospitals at 400% of FPL. The policy at Day Kimball Hospital in Putnam for discounted care is less generous than the for-profit hospitals, while Middlesex, Connecticut Children’s and Yale New Haven Health system have more generous policies. 

Trinity Health of New England spokesperson Kaitlin Rocheleau said that the system takes its commitment to the community seriously and holds themselves accountable through transparent financial reporting.

"Our care also goes beyond hospital beds, and our reach extends to provide housing and other social services needed to create healthy communities," stated Rocheleau in emailed comments. The system runs a program called Transforming Communities Initiative, which provides $350,000 annually for four years to each of its Connecticut hospitals to address needs identified in their community needs assessments. The system also provides grant funding to community programs and extended a $5 million low-interest loan to the Local Initiative Support Collaborative .

Differences in policies

Financial assistance policies aren’t uniform across hospitals, which can make understanding eligibility difficult for consumers. 

Each organization can determine income eligibility thresholds and, in certain instances, which services to cover. OHS found that, in some cases, the services covered differed even within a single hospital system. 

Most notably, Hartford HealthCare’s financial assistance policy excludes emergency physician services at three of its hospitals: MidState Medical Center, Windham Memorial and the Hospital of Central Connecticut Bradley Memorial campus in Southington.

“In effect, Hartford HealthCare has two Financial Assistance Policies, one for those seeking emergency care at four of the system’s hospitals, and another for those seeking emergency care at the system's other three hospitals,” noted the authors.

Hartford HealthCare also excludes from charity care eligibility primary care physician services provided outside the hospital setting, including at physician offices and via telehealth. The report’s authors noted that “excluding primary care services at an office is not the standard across the state.” Other health systems, including Yale New Haven Health, Trinity and Nuvance, exclude services provided by specific physicians. 

Hartford HealthCare declined to comment directly and pointed to the Connecticut Hospital Association for additional information.

When asked about why financial assistance policies differ across hospitals and whether standardization would benefit patients, the CHA spokesperson said that Connecticut hospitals “have strong financial assistance policies and nearly all have extended well beyond statutory requirements.”

Other findings

The largest category within community benefit spending was the unreimbursed costs of Medicaid, totaling $1 billion, or over 60% of the total spending. Both advocates and CHA agree that this shows the urgent need to increase Medicaid reimbursement rates to providers .

“This is demonstrating a break in our system,” said Donelson, the Connecticut Health Foundation CEO. “We aren’t reimbursing at the rates that we should as a state. In addition, that is giving these systems rationale to not invest in the things that the community is asking for.”

The authors’ final recommendations included expanding community benefit reporting requirements to include the hospitals’ calculations, which could help OHS delve into causes for increases and decreases in spending. The agency also recommended expanding reporting requirements to include investments made in local health effects and community-based organizations. 

The report also lays out considerations for how Connecticut can explore setting its own standards to address the lack of consistency in community benefits policies and reporting, including an example from Oregon where the state passed a law standardizing income limits for free care. 

A bill currently under consideration by the legislature seeks to standardize certain elements of charity care, including implementing a universal financial assistance application and requiring hospitals to annually report the number of patients requesting financial assistance.

The Office of Health Strategy is accepting comments on the report through April 30. 

Katy Golvala Investigative Reporter

Katy Golvala is a member of our three-person investigative team. Originally from New Jersey, Katy earned a bachelor’s degree in English and Mathematics from Williams College and received a master’s degree in Business and Economic Journalism from the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism in August 2021. Her work experience includes roles as a Business Analyst at A.T. Kearney, a Reporter and Researcher at Investment Wires, and a Reporter at Inframation, covering infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean.

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Meghan Markle Shows Off Her Acting Skills During Special Storytime at Children's Hospital Los Angeles

This isn't the first time the Duchess of Sussex, who authored a children's book, has connected with kids through stories

Stephanie Petit is a Royals Editor, Writer and Reporter at PEOPLE.

Children's Hospital Los Angeles

Storytime with Meghan Markle !

The Duchess of Sussex, 42, visited the Children's Hospital Los Angeles on March 21, where she led a Literally Healing session.

"Children were laughing and singing as The Duchess turned into character with every page as she read patient favorite books like Rosie the Riveter, Pete the Cat and I Saw a Cat," according to a statement. Meghan also helped children with STEAM activities connected to each book.

In a video of the visit, Meghan greeted the children as they gathered for the engaging reading time, excitedly showing the cover of Rosie Revere, Engineer and telling the group, "This is one of my favorites."

The mom of two — she shares a 4-year-old son, Prince Archie , and a 2-year-old daughter,  Princess Lilibet , with Prince Harry  — gave animated readings, adding voice inflections and gestures to go along with the stories.

Children shouted out answers and sang along as Meghan read Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons. "This was a great choice, friends," she said as she closed the book and declared, "The end."

Meghan also posed with photos with children, talking to a young girl about how "neat" an instant camera image was.

This isn't the first time Meghan's storytelling skills were on display. To mark Archie's first birthday in May 2020, the Duchess of Sussex and her son appeared in a video where she read the book Duck! Rabbit! by Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld.

Children's Hospital Los Angeles

Archie's relationship with dad Prince Harry also inspired Meghan to author a children's book , The Bench.

" The Bench  started as a poem I wrote for my husband on Father’s Day, the month after Archie was born," Meghan said in the press release from publisher Random House Children's Books. "That poem became this story."

Meghan dedicated the book to Harry and Archie : "For the man and the boy who make my heart go pump-pump," the dedication says.

As a guest on Brightly Storytime, the Duchess of Sussex read  The Bench in a  YouTube video in 2021, and she also shared her story with children at P.S. 123 Mahalia Jackson School in Harlem during a visit in September of the same year.

"I wrote this when we just had our little boy, and I haven't read it to any other kids but you!" she told the group, who sat together with Prince Harry to hear the reading.

Can't get enough of PEOPLE's Royals coverage?  Sign up for our free Royals newsletter  to get the latest updates on Kate Middleton, Meghan Markle and more!

Children's Hospital Los Angeles' Literally Healing is a reading program that gifts families at the hospital more than 65,000 books annually and provides a unique opportunity to promote literacy. The storytime was part of Make March Matter, an annual fundraiser at the hospital that "unites celebrities, business and the greater community in support of its mission of creating hope and building healthier futures."

Since 2016, the campaign has raised more than $10 million for the Children's Hospital Los Angeles.

Celebrities are known to pop into Children's Hospital Los Angeles to cheer up patients, from Mark Hamill reading Darth Vader and Son  by Jeffrey Brown during a virtual visit in 2021 to Tom Holland ,  Zendaya  and  Jake Gyllenhaal  giving youngsters a special advanced screening of Spider-Man: Far From Home   in 2019.

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Report: Seahawks schedule pre-draft visit with star Penn State pass rusher

Chop Robinson is considered one of the top pass rushers in the 2024 NFL Draft.

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Share All sharing options for: Report: Seahawks schedule pre-draft visit with star Penn State pass rusher

The Seattle Seahawks have struggled to generate a consistent pass rush from their defensive front since Frank Clark was traded, and it’s certainly not been for lack of investment. As the Seahawks go through their official 30 visits* ahead of the 2024 NFL Draft , they’re reportedly set to meet with one of the top defensive ends in this year’s class.

*- I’m giving up on the “top 30” moniker since it’s a silly misnomer. We’ll just roll with “official 30” visit or a “pre-draft visit” to avoid any confusion.

NFL insider Aaron Wilson reports that the Seahawks are among the several teams scheduled to have a formal visit with Penn State’s first-team All-Big Ten star Demeioun ‘Chop’ Robinson.

Penn State @PennStateFball defensive end Chop Robinson has visits with #Saints #Eagles #Giants #Jets #Ravens #Seahawks #Bears #Commanders #Cardinals per league sources @KPRC2 #NFLDraft2024 https://t.co/ePT4AUjbpB — Aaron Wilson (@AaronWilson_NFL) April 4, 2024

The first thing to point out with Robinson is that he was a combine standout and his Relative Athletic Score (RAS) is extremely impressive.

Chop Robinson is a DE prospect in the 2024 draft class. He scored a 9.71 #RAS out of a possible 10.00. This ranked 52 out of 1738 DE from 1987 to 2024. https://t.co/nr7WGJIvZa pic.twitter.com/TYu9pow0TY — Kent Lee Platte (@MathBomb) April 1, 2024

Having great athletic traits is obviously not in itself enough to make for a formidable NFL-level player. His 11.5 sacks over three college seasons (one at Maryland and two at Penn State) is hardly eye-opening, so why is he one of the top players on the consensus big board with a considerable chance to be drafted in the back-half of the first round? Here’s what The Athletic’s Dane Brugler has to say about Chop:

While some pass rushers require a runway to build up speed, Robinson accelerates 0-to-60 in a blink, creating instant suddenness from his spot to shoot gaps or win races to the corner. He shows natural rush instincts and uses a variety of swats, swipes and dips to evade blocks, although his counters need further development. He is a tough run defender but is slightly undersized and could use additional bulk to better match up with NFL blockers.

Pro Football Focus ranked Robinson 13th in college football in pass rush win rate (20.9%), which means he’s impacting the quarterback even without getting the sacks.

We have seen the likes of Odafe Oweh (Baltimore Ravens) and Trayvon Walker (Jacksonville Jaguars) get drafted in the first round—Walker, of course, went No. 1 overall—despite a lack of gaudy sack numbers. In Oweh’s case, he didn’t have a sack in his final year of college. Sacks can be volatile, but pressure rate and pass rush win rate tends to be a better indicator for the quality of an edge. Danielle Hunter is one of the NFL’s best edge rushers and he had 4.5 sacks in college.

As for Chop’s weaknesses? Here’s what the Big Blue View scouting report had to say.

Robinson is an elite athlete for the position, but he lacks the technical refinement to fully unlock his athletic upside. As things stand now, Robinson’s hand usage is underdeveloped and haphazard. While he seems to want to use techniques like rip or club moves, his hands are unfocused and not crisp. He doesn’t really neutralize blockers hands and doesn’t cleanly defeat their blocks. That can slow his rushes and prevent him from capitalizing on his explosive first step. Robinson also lacks ideal length compared to the NFL’s archetype for the position. That too can limit the advantage given to him by his impressive athleticism. Combined with his poor technique, blockers are often able to get their hands on him first despite his explosive first step.

This all reads to me that Robinson would be your classic super athlete whose game can be best described as “raw.” He’s not as refined as UCLA’s Laiatu Latu, but with the right coaching, as well as his own ability to improve upon his game and add to his skillset, he has the physical gifts to be a potentially special pro. This is also to say that he’s probably not going to be wowing right away as a rookie.

Watch his highlight reel below:

More From Field Gulls

• Top NFL Draft defensive tackle prospect arrested
• Pre-Snap Reads 4/7: Chop Robinson to visit Seahawks
• Cigar Thoughts Podcast, Episode 135: Whitewater Drafting - Penix Hype and the D-Line Class
• John Schneider says role is ‘exactly the same’ even without Pete Carroll
• Seattle is compelled to (eventually) draft a defensive tackle early
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This week on n field: bomb cyclone.

March 2024 marked the five-year anniversary of the bomb cyclone hitting Nebraska. This can be a reminder of the resources available to those affected by significant weather events. In this episode, Nebraska Extension Educator Amy Timmerman reflects on how the 2019 bomb cyclone affected Nebraskans, both then and now, and where individuals can seek help to cope with lingering impacts.

Visit the UNL Disaster Education site for more.

Follow the links below to listen to this episode on your favorite platform:

A product of Nebraska Extension, N Field Observations is a weekly podcast where UNL professionals share their field observations in brief segments, highlights specific topics and issues occurring in agriculture.

The N Field Observations Team

Amy Timmerman Water and Integrated Cropping Systems Extension Educator Holt County Extension [email protected]

Aaron Nygren Water and Integrated Cropping Systems Extension Educator Saunders County Extension [email protected]

Todd Whitney Water and Integrated Cropping Systems Extension Educator Phelps County Extension [email protected]

Wayne Ohnesorg Extension Educator, Entomologist Madison County Extension [email protected]

Steve Melvin Irrigated Cropping Systems Extension Educator Merrick County Extension [email protected]

Chuck Burr Water and Integrated Cropping Systems Extension Educator West Central Research, Extension and Education Center [email protected]

John Thomas Water and Integrated Cropping Systems Extension Educator Box Butte County Extension [email protected]

Dylan Mangel Extension Plant Pathologist UNL Department of Plant Pathology [email protected]

Tamra Jackson-Ziems Extension Plant Pathologist UNL Department of Plant Pathology [email protected]

Amit Jhala Extension Weed Management Specialist Department of Agronomy and Horticulture [email protected]

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With a focus on industry applications and research, the online program is designed with maximum flexibility for today's working professionals.

WEEKEND RUNDOWN: Here's the biggest news you missed this weekend

'I kept on saying goodbye': Gaza hospital reports rise in stillbirths and neonatal deaths

TEL AVIV — When Mai Kamal Zaqout learned she was pregnant in December, she and her husband, Ahmad, felt something they hadn’t experienced in many weeks in G aza : happiness — a glimmer of optimism amid the war’s devastation and despair.

Zaqout, 22, said Ahmad placed his hand on her belly and told her: “This is it. She is our last hope.”

But within months, that hope was shattered.

Ahmad, 29, was killed in an airstrike.

Then Zaqout fled south to Rafah, where more than a million people have sought refuge, in hopes of giving birth to her daughter in safety.

But Zaqout fell ill, weak from a lack of food and clean drinking water. Already grieving, she received another devastating blow seven months into her pregnancy: Her baby no longer had a heartbeat. 

“I didn’t understand. I started crying and screaming,” she told an NBC News crew on the ground late last month. “All of the hospital gathered,” she said, asking, “‘What’s wrong with her? Why is she crying?’”

“I started saying, ‘Check again. Make sure,’” she said. 

Her baby was stillborn in March.

Doctors in Gaza and humanitarian groups told NBC News that Zaqout is one of a growing number of women who have lost pregnancies or had complications, another dire consequence of the war.

“The doctors told me malnutrition had a big role in this,” Zaqout said. “I was not able to eat properly. I didn’t take vitamins. There was nothing available. … The water was polluted. I was feeling it.”

Zaqout said she visited the Emirati Hospital in Rafah during her pregnancy. Dr. Haider Abu Sneima, the hospital’s director, told NBC News last month that various factors were affecting maternal health there.

The little food that is available lacks “proteins, vitamins or vegetables, and if you find them, prices are out of the imaginary,” he said. "A pregnant woman or her family can’t obtain them."

On top of that, Abu Sneima added, the psychological pressures of the war have “a very negative effect on the mother and her baby.”

In recent weeks, he said, there appeared to be a rise in babies being born premature and generally “small in size.”

“We don’t see big children like we used to give birth to in the past. We don’t see these children anymore,” he said.

Dominic Allen, the designated representative for Palestinian territories with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), said that when he visited Gaza last month, doctors at the Emirati Hospital similarly told him that they were no longer seeing “normal-sized” babies.

They reported “more complications around births caused, they’re telling us, by malnutrition and dehydration and from stress,” Allen said. “What they are seeing is an increased number of stillborn babies and neonatal deaths.”

NBC News could not independently verify those reported trends, and no data was available to confirm them. The Israel Defense Forces did not respond to a request for comment.

The World Health Organization has repeatedly said that malnourishment is rising in Gaza.

“Different doctors particularly in the maternity hospitals are reporting that they’re seeing a big rise in children born [with] low birth weight and just not surviving the neonatal period because they are born too small,” WHO spokeswoman Dr. Margaret Harris said Tuesday at a briefing .

The reports come amid mounting concerns about looming  famine in Gaza. Already, Palestinian health authorities reported that at least 27 people, including children, have died from severe malnutrition in the enclave. Israel faces growing pressure from the international community to expedite the delivery of aid into Gaza, which it has been accused of restricting. 

Israeli authorities have denied hindering the flow of aid into Gaza and have instead blamed humanitarian groups for the issue.

According to the UNFPA, around 155,000 pregnant women and new mothers in Gaza are “struggling to survive.”

“They are suffering from hunger and the diseases that stalk it, amid life-threatening shortages of food, water and medical care,” the agency wrote on its website .

“For the 5,500 women who will give birth in the coming month, accessing adequate health care is an unimaginable challenge. Only three maternity hospitals remain in the Gaza Strip, and they are overwhelmed with patients,” it said, adding: “Doctors and midwives — desperate for medicines and supplies — are struggling to provide adequate care to newborns.”

Dr. Angela Bianco, director of maternal fetal medicine and a professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive science at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York, said she wasn’t surprised by the Rafah doctors’ reports, though limited data makes it difficult to draw conclusions.

“When you look at the world’s medical literature and you look at the impact of stress on pregnancy outcomes, there is data that definitely supports that there’s an increased rate of adverse pregnancy outcomes and specifically stillbirth and preterm birth in the face of maternal stress — specifically more so extreme stress.”

Zaqout said that after losing her husband, her baby girl was “my last hope.” 

“For real. I was dreaming about her,” she said. 

Zaqout’s husband is one of the more than 32,600 people killed in Gaza in the nearly six months since Israel launched its offensive after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks. Roughly 1,200 people were killed in Israel that day, and some 260 were taken hostage. At least 252 IDF soldiers have been killed since Israel’s ground offensive began.

Speaking with NBC News in Gaza on March 23, UNICEF’s global spokesperson, James Elder, said a cease-fire is necessary to address the spiraling humanitarian crisis in the enclave. 

“People are exhausted, the coping mechanisms have been smashed,” he said. “The health system is teetering on collapse, and now we have imminent famine.”

Zaqout does not know exactly why her baby was stillborn, but she said she believes it was a consequence of Israel’s offensive in Gaza.

After the delivery, she said, “I kept on saying goodbye.”

“I told her, ‘Go to your father, a bird in paradise. I will wait for you and be patient, and we’ll back to what we were,’” she said. “We were a family on Earth. We will be in the afterlife.”

Chantal Da Silva is a breaking news editor for NBC News Digital based in London. 

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40 facts about elektrostal.

Written by Lanette Mayes

Modified & Updated: 02 Mar 2024

Reviewed by Jessica Corbett

Elektrostal is a vibrant city located in the Moscow Oblast region of Russia. With a rich history, stunning architecture, and a thriving community, Elektrostal is a city that has much to offer. Whether you are a history buff, nature enthusiast, or simply curious about different cultures, Elektrostal is sure to captivate you.

This article will provide you with 40 fascinating facts about Elektrostal, giving you a better understanding of why this city is worth exploring. From its origins as an industrial hub to its modern-day charm, we will delve into the various aspects that make Elektrostal a unique and must-visit destination.

So, join us as we uncover the hidden treasures of Elektrostal and discover what makes this city a true gem in the heart of Russia.

Key Takeaways:

• Elektrostal, known as the “Motor City of Russia,” is a vibrant and growing city with a rich industrial history, offering diverse cultural experiences and a strong commitment to environmental sustainability.
• With its convenient location near Moscow, Elektrostal provides a picturesque landscape, vibrant nightlife, and a range of recreational activities, making it an ideal destination for residents and visitors alike.

Known as the “Motor City of Russia.”

Elektrostal, a city located in the Moscow Oblast region of Russia, earned the nickname “Motor City” due to its significant involvement in the automotive industry.

Home to the Elektrostal Metallurgical Plant.

Elektrostal is renowned for its metallurgical plant, which has been producing high-quality steel and alloys since its establishment in 1916.

Boasts a rich industrial heritage.

Elektrostal has a long history of industrial development, contributing to the growth and progress of the region.

Founded in 1916.

The city of Elektrostal was founded in 1916 as a result of the construction of the Elektrostal Metallurgical Plant.

Located approximately 50 kilometers east of Moscow.

Elektrostal is situated in close proximity to the Russian capital, making it easily accessible for both residents and visitors.

Known for its vibrant cultural scene.

Elektrostal is home to several cultural institutions, including museums, theaters, and art galleries that showcase the city’s rich artistic heritage.

A popular destination for nature lovers.

Surrounded by picturesque landscapes and forests, Elektrostal offers ample opportunities for outdoor activities such as hiking, camping, and birdwatching.

Hosts the annual Elektrostal City Day celebrations.

Every year, Elektrostal organizes festive events and activities to celebrate its founding, bringing together residents and visitors in a spirit of unity and joy.

Has a population of approximately 160,000 people.

Elektrostal is home to a diverse and vibrant community of around 160,000 residents, contributing to its dynamic atmosphere.

Boasts excellent education facilities.

The city is known for its well-established educational institutions, providing quality education to students of all ages.

A center for scientific research and innovation.

Elektrostal serves as an important hub for scientific research, particularly in the fields of metallurgy, materials science, and engineering.

Surrounded by picturesque lakes.

The city is blessed with numerous beautiful lakes, offering scenic views and recreational opportunities for locals and visitors alike.

Well-connected transportation system.

Elektrostal benefits from an efficient transportation network, including highways, railways, and public transportation options, ensuring convenient travel within and beyond the city.

Famous for its traditional Russian cuisine.

Food enthusiasts can indulge in authentic Russian dishes at numerous restaurants and cafes scattered throughout Elektrostal.

Home to notable architectural landmarks.

Elektrostal boasts impressive architecture, including the Church of the Transfiguration of the Lord and the Elektrostal Palace of Culture.

Offers a wide range of recreational facilities.

Residents and visitors can enjoy various recreational activities, such as sports complexes, swimming pools, and fitness centers, enhancing the overall quality of life.

Provides a high standard of healthcare.

Elektrostal is equipped with modern medical facilities, ensuring residents have access to quality healthcare services.

Home to the Elektrostal History Museum.

The Elektrostal History Museum showcases the city’s fascinating past through exhibitions and displays.

A hub for sports enthusiasts.

Elektrostal is passionate about sports, with numerous stadiums, arenas, and sports clubs offering opportunities for athletes and spectators.

Celebrates diverse cultural festivals.

Throughout the year, Elektrostal hosts a variety of cultural festivals, celebrating different ethnicities, traditions, and art forms.

Electric power played a significant role in its early development.

Elektrostal owes its name and initial growth to the establishment of electric power stations and the utilization of electricity in the industrial sector.

Boasts a thriving economy.

The city’s strong industrial base, coupled with its strategic location near Moscow, has contributed to Elektrostal’s prosperous economic status.

Houses the Elektrostal Drama Theater.

The Elektrostal Drama Theater is a cultural centerpiece, attracting theater enthusiasts from far and wide.

Popular destination for winter sports.

Elektrostal’s proximity to ski resorts and winter sport facilities makes it a favorite destination for skiing, snowboarding, and other winter activities.

Promotes environmental sustainability.

Elektrostal prioritizes environmental protection and sustainability, implementing initiatives to reduce pollution and preserve natural resources.

Home to renowned educational institutions.

Elektrostal is known for its prestigious schools and universities, offering a wide range of academic programs to students.

Committed to cultural preservation.

The city values its cultural heritage and takes active steps to preserve and promote traditional customs, crafts, and arts.

Hosts an annual International Film Festival.

The Elektrostal International Film Festival attracts filmmakers and cinema enthusiasts from around the world, showcasing a diverse range of films.

Encourages entrepreneurship and innovation.

Elektrostal supports aspiring entrepreneurs and fosters a culture of innovation, providing opportunities for startups and business development.

Offers a range of housing options.

Elektrostal provides diverse housing options, including apartments, houses, and residential complexes, catering to different lifestyles and budgets.

Home to notable sports teams.

Elektrostal is proud of its sports legacy, with several successful sports teams competing at regional and national levels.

Boasts a vibrant nightlife scene.

Residents and visitors can enjoy a lively nightlife in Elektrostal, with numerous bars, clubs, and entertainment venues.

Promotes cultural exchange and international relations.

Elektrostal actively engages in international partnerships, cultural exchanges, and diplomatic collaborations to foster global connections.

Surrounded by beautiful nature reserves.

Nearby nature reserves, such as the Barybino Forest and Luchinskoye Lake, offer opportunities for nature enthusiasts to explore and appreciate the region’s biodiversity.

Commemorates historical events.

The city pays tribute to significant historical events through memorials, monuments, and exhibitions, ensuring the preservation of collective memory.

Promotes sports and youth development.

Elektrostal invests in sports infrastructure and programs to encourage youth participation, health, and physical fitness.

Hosts annual cultural and artistic festivals.

Throughout the year, Elektrostal celebrates its cultural diversity through festivals dedicated to music, dance, art, and theater.

Provides a picturesque landscape for photography enthusiasts.

The city’s scenic beauty, architectural landmarks, and natural surroundings make it a paradise for photographers.

Connects to Moscow via a direct train line.

The convenient train connection between Elektrostal and Moscow makes commuting between the two cities effortless.

A city with a bright future.

Elektrostal continues to grow and develop, aiming to become a model city in terms of infrastructure, sustainability, and quality of life for its residents.

In conclusion, Elektrostal is a fascinating city with a rich history and a vibrant present. From its origins as a center of steel production to its modern-day status as a hub for education and industry, Elektrostal has plenty to offer both residents and visitors. With its beautiful parks, cultural attractions, and proximity to Moscow, there is no shortage of things to see and do in this dynamic city. Whether you’re interested in exploring its historical landmarks, enjoying outdoor activities, or immersing yourself in the local culture, Elektrostal has something for everyone. So, next time you find yourself in the Moscow region, don’t miss the opportunity to discover the hidden gems of Elektrostal.

Q: What is the population of Elektrostal?

A: As of the latest data, the population of Elektrostal is approximately XXXX.

Q: How far is Elektrostal from Moscow?

A: Elektrostal is located approximately XX kilometers away from Moscow.

Q: Are there any famous landmarks in Elektrostal?

A: Yes, Elektrostal is home to several notable landmarks, including XXXX and XXXX.

Q: What industries are prominent in Elektrostal?

A: Elektrostal is known for its steel production industry and is also a center for engineering and manufacturing.

Q: Are there any universities or educational institutions in Elektrostal?

A: Yes, Elektrostal is home to XXXX University and several other educational institutions.

Q: What are some popular outdoor activities in Elektrostal?

A: Elektrostal offers several outdoor activities, such as hiking, cycling, and picnicking in its beautiful parks.

Q: Is Elektrostal well-connected in terms of transportation?

A: Yes, Elektrostal has good transportation links, including trains and buses, making it easily accessible from nearby cities.

Q: Are there any annual events or festivals in Elektrostal?

A: Yes, Elektrostal hosts various events and festivals throughout the year, including XXXX and XXXX.

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