Researching dynamic lighting’s boost to health

This article recasts the way lighting systems in healthcare estates are commonly valued. We look beyond the carbon footprint savings, and outline the demographic and human resource challenges facing Estates managers. By looking at interior lighting in its full dimension, through its essential attributes (brightness, color temperature, and spatial cognition), Estates and Facilities managers may discover new tools that can mitigate occupant distress issues through environmental design solutions that combat staff burnout, and supply emotional support to patients and their families during delays in discharge, or when bed occupation rates are high. By gaining an understanding of the more complex cognitive and biological ramifications of lighting design in clinical settings, such personnel will gain an integrated outlook on occupant wellbeing that may be instrumental in their decision-making.

The prevalent cost-benefit analysis carried out on NHS estates regarding facility lighting continues to be viewed through the lens of climate change. The costs associated with the carbon footprint that older, less efficient technologies like fluorescent fixtures exhibit can be calculated with confidence. While this calculation is valuable in helping the NHS achieve its ambitious target of reaching Net Zero emissions for those it controls directly by 2040, it is pertinent to remember that savings earned from the switch to LED fixtures are not the sole benefit.¹

Even though energy costs — which include those related to electricity, HVAC, and specialised medical equipment in high demand environments like hospitals, represent about 35% of the operating costs, both the lighting design and the quality of the lighting in clinical spaces enhance (or detract from) staff productivity.² In fact, the illumination in high-stress medical environments has a direct bearing on both performance and patient outcomes.