HaCIRIC Conference

The second annual conference of HaCIRIC (Health and Care Infrastructure Research and Innovation Centre) took place in Brighton these last two days. It was in the Brighton Metropole Hotel, on the seafront, although the location could have been anywhere, because, typically, none of the rooms we used had any windows, and the decor was standard 1980s stuff, which could have been anywhere in the world. But when we ate, we had great views of the sea. The presentations at the conference were very good indeed, ranging from strategic health planning through to the way that stroke patients were dealt with in UK compared with USA. It was really useful being able to connect the way that health services are planned with the funding, design and construction of the facilities themselves. As before, many of us found ourselves questioning why the health service needs capital assets, and struggling with the tensions between the needs for operational efficiency on the one hand, and the iconic value a hospital has for the community in which it is based. It seems that local politics demands that every community can identify itself with a hospital of some kind. National politics demands that vote-catching policies are more important than evidence-based health care. And no one wants to pay for health care, apparently. It certainly brought home to me the difficulty of developing a rational and effective health service. Within this complex and difficult context, the HaCIRIC researchers are trying to develop understanding,and provide tools and techniques that will help to resolve some of the inherent difficulties in the provision of the built environment for health care. The conference brought together people from all aspects of the health service, and provided some enlightening and informative moments for all of us.