Hospital patients would benefit from the ‘Light Diet’ proposed by Lighting Design House, senior designer Dina Chowdury told a recent panel discussion between NHS facilities and energy managers and lighting professionals, chaired by Lux magazine. ‘In hospitals, the ideal is to have LED panels to achieve general lighting of 150 lux on wards, which can be automated with manual override at the nurse station,’ Dina told Lux. ‘Patients would then have local task lighting via a bedside light, with colour options that they can control. The perfect formula is a pinch of blue to kickstart activity, a dollop of sunlight, some swirls of visual delight, a pinch of amber red later in the day and a big dollop of darkness to aid sleep.’
In addition to how to use hospital lighting to improve patient outcomes, the panel also looked at ways to save the National Health Service energy. The NHS needs to standardise its LED lighting, Dina said. ‘You can get LEDs with 2700K colour temperatures now and CRIs of 90 which perform like halogens. But whereas halogens can all run on the same transformers, every LED lamp has a different driver. Standardisation is needed because otherwise the NHS will be left with an inventory problem.’
Click Lux magazine on hospital lighting to read the full report