Abstract
In the hospital ward, there are several ancillary rooms such as nurses' station, treatment room, clean-and dirty-utility rooms, pantry and linen storage etc. How we shall design these facilities? We tried to make studies of the actual point-to-point sequence of movement of nurses and doctors in ward units (medical, surgical, obstetric, children's and tuberculosis units) at three hospitals-The Hiroo Metropolitan Hospital, The Tokyo Second National Hospital and The Kanto Telecommunication Hospital. We, observers, followed each nurse and doctor and recorded their excursions and stays in various rooms. The record showed how frequently journeys were made from the beds to the various ancillary rooms, and between ancillary rooms and how long each room was occupied by nurses and doctors. The follwings are some of the details: 1) Nurses' station is the room which nurses and doctors visit most frequently and is the cardinal point of movement. 2) Nearly all of these movement is one between nurses' station and the beds. 3) The space for doctor is required in the nurses' station since he stays there rather long time. 4) Other ancillary rooms, i.e. treatment room, clean-and dirty-utility rooms and linen storage, are to be placed close to nurses' station.
