Case Study // Optimizing Imaging Patient Flow and Experience at a Pediatric Hospital
A children's hospital asked BA for better signage. BA Science, led by Director of Research Meredith Banasiak, helped redesign the patient journey instead.
The Challenge
When an expanding interventional radiology program claimed space in the hospital's imaging department, x-ray, ultrasound and fluoroscopy had to move. Their new home sat across a large, busy atrium from MRI, CT and nuclear medicine.
Most imaging patients are first-time visitors, and many are young children, some arriving with a stroller and a sibling in tow. Where do they check in? Which side is their appointment on? And if a child needs studies done on both sides of the atrium, how does the family get from one suite to the other? Staff were already walking more than an hour per shift to transport patients.
The hospital asked the BA design team, led by James Lenhart and Mary Fiore, for an environmental wayfinding solution. The team suspected signs alone couldn't answer questions the hospital hadn't yet answered for itself. BA proposed a different order of operations: define the ideal arrival, check-in, and transfer process first, then design the physical elements to support it. That's where BA Science came in.
Research that puts Children at the Center
Meredith Banasiak, BA’s Director of Research, led the study, drawing on her work at the intersection of neuroscience and architecture. Pediatric patients often have heightened sensitivity to their surroundings and little ability to voice stress or advocate for themselves. Thus, the research set three goals: reduce stress for children and caregivers during imaging studies, make the department easier to navigate, and streamline process and flow for staff.
The team observed the department at work, interviewed staff, reviewed published research and benchmarks, and mapped current processes. From that data, they built six patient personas spanning every modality and visit type.
For each persona, the team traced patient and staff routes across the floor plan for every check-in option, with and without a staff escort. Each route was scored on travel distance and time, handoffs, and the number of distinct spaces a family must pass through. The more spaces, the more likely they were to get lost.
The Whole-Team Exercise
BA proposed a four-day event to go through the process mapping exercise in detail, but the hospital could only assemble all the necessary departments for three hours. Because Meredith's team had already tested every arrival, check-in, and transfer permutation, the workshop could run quickly, focusing on decisions rather than discovery.
For the exercise, the team brought together patient transport, registration, coding and billing, IT, child life, nursing, and every imaging specialty. BA Science's Romano Nickerson led the process mapping, and the group walked through each persona's journey, compared scenarios side by side, and agreed on an ideal process.
The Results
• 23% fewer patient process steps
• 23% fewer staff process steps
• 14% shorter patient travel for diagnostic imaging
• One fewer patient handoff
Staff travel went up, and that was a deliberate choice. The group agreed that staff-escorted transfers were among the biggest drivers of patient satisfaction, so the hospital chose to spend staff time with families rather than trim walking distance.
The workshop also had the effect of bringing together a wide range of departments into the same room to find solutions face to face, often for the first time. "We watched a cultural change occur in that workshop," said BA's James Lenhart.
The project was one of the first partnerships between BA Science and a BA design team. Moreover, it showed what Meredith's research brings to the table: by starting with people and process, BA turned a signage request into a better experience for patients, families, and staff.
