Nursing Home Garden Design For Elderly Care Patients At Wesley Woods Hospital

With the development of modern western medicine, the social demographic structurechanged dramatically at the beginning of the21st century.Issues about long-term care forelderly are getting more and more importantas the rapid growth of aging populationin the lastdecades. At present, the theories and applications of therapeutic gardens have been widelyaccepted by the United States, western countries and Japan. However, there are many issuesregarding the health care facilities designed for elderly people. This Thesis aims to proposingthe new design principles to promote the quality of life of the elderly through literature review,site investigation, and summarizations. In addition, by providing such a pleasant outdoorspace,it is expected thatan environment can be designed to strengthen the link betweencaregivers and residents;to alleviate the dread and despair of nursing homes; and to decrease theresidents’ dependency on physical therapy. The ultimate goal of this thesis is to call attention tothe mental health of elderly people.First, this study introduces the general backgrounds of nursing homes and life quality ofthe elderly as well as analyzes the deficiencies of environmental design in nursing homes. Forbetter understanding the environmental design in such kind of health care facilities, chapterthree reviews boththeories and research oftherapeutic gardens. Then, chapter four illustrates thecharacteristics of homes and the detail design for each characteristic in order to summarize anew design principle for nursing home gardens. Based on the previous introductions,analysis,and summarizations, the last chapter evaluates an existing garden design in Alzheimer’scourtyard gardenand applies the new garden design principle to the potential garden space atWesley Woods Geriatric Hospital, Atlanta, Georgia.