Creating a Place Where Specialist Care Comes Together
Every year, children and young people born with cleft lip and palate conditions require highly coordinated support from a wide range of specialists. Treatment often spans many years and involves surgeons, speech and language therapists, psychologists, orthodontists, dentists, nurses and medical photographers working together to support patients and families through every stage of care. Guy’s & St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust recognised the opportunity to bring these services together within a purpose-designed environment that could better support multidisciplinary working while creating a more welcoming experience for patients.
Concept and Strategy
The challenge was not simply to accommodate a clinical brief. The facility needed to support a highly specialised service while recognising that many patients would return repeatedly throughout childhood and adolescence. Creating an environment that felt reassuring, engaging and age-appropriate became a central design driver.
The new department provides dedicated waiting areas for children, adolescents and adults, recognising that different patient groups experience healthcare environments in different ways. Specialist accommodation includes soundproof speech and language therapy rooms, psychology consulting facilities, dental imaging suites, multidisciplinary assessment spaces and a state-of-the-art orthodontic and dental treatment area.
Working closely with clinicians and service users, BMJ developed a design that balances clinical functionality with a more welcoming and human-centred experience. Integrated artwork and visual storytelling elements reference landscapes and landmarks from across the service’s catchment area, helping create moments of familiarity, curiosity and distraction throughout the patient journey. Rather than feeling institutional, the department creates an environment that supports confidence, comfort and wellbeing.
Bringing Specialist Care Together
A key strength of the project is its ability to bring multiple specialisms together within a single coordinated setting. Clinicians can work more closely as multidisciplinary teams, improving communication and reducing the need for patients and families to navigate multiple locations across the hospital estate. This integrated approach supports more efficient care pathways while helping create a better overall experience for patients.
Today, the facility provides a specialist environment that reflects the quality of care delivered by one of the UK’s leading cleft services. By bringing together expertise, technology and patient-centred design, the project demonstrates how thoughtful healthcare architecture can support both clinical excellence and the long-term wellbeing of patients and families.
Explore the Details
