Clinical, humanistic and economic outcomes associated with single rooms compared with shared accommodation for acute hospital admissions

What the study found

Patients often preferred single rooms for privacy and shared rooms for social interaction; sleep perceptions often favored single rooms while objective noise differences were less consistent.

Limitations

Large heterogeneous evidence base; many outcomes observational; room design intertwined with care processes.

Neurodesign interpretation

The room-type question is not private versus social. Good design can attempt to preserve both by making connection controllable rather than compulsory.

Possible design implications

Design single rooms with social connection, visibility and caregiver access rather than treating enclosure as a complete solution.

Why it stays in the corpus

Retain as the most current broad room-type trade-off review in this corpus.

Study design

Systematic review and narrative synthesis

Population

Acute hospital patients

Setting

Hospitals

Field

Healthcare design

Mechanism

Privacy, social contact, sleep, safety

Spatial variable

Single versus shared rooms

Keywords

hospital, single rooms, shared rooms, privacy, sleep, social interaction