A hospital’s physical infrastructure is often outdated and incompatible with digital technologies, sustainability goals, and easy navigation. Many hospitals feel sterile, with bare walls and mazelike layouts, while hallways overflow with misplaced beds, IV poles, and diagnostic machines. It’s not unusual for patients and family members to get lost. Even basic processes such as food, laundry, and medicine delivery can slow operations and create confusion.
My Visit To A Smart Hospital
As a former practicing clinician, I’ve walked the halls of many hospitals — but none quite like Baden Cantonal Hospital (KSB) in Switzerland. During my recent visit, I saw firsthand how KSB is changing the narrative as it transforms into an intelligent healthcare organization (IHO). Built over a decade, the facility consolidated 13 floors of operations into three, creating a streamlined, digitally enabled environment that redefines what modern care delivery can look like. Here are some of the things that stood out to me:
Healing architecture. With soothing colors, natural wood finishes, escalators in high-traffic areas, and natural light in almost every room, KSB’s design choices are intended to promote warmth and healing.
Human-centric design. Patient units follow an open concept. There aren’t doors or separate corridors for different specialties, allowing staff to engage in cross-functional teamwork and communication. KSB installed bedside terminals that let patients charge devices, control lighting, and interact with care teams.
Digital infrastructure. KSB integrated a centralized lab system. It uses automated vehicles for food delivery, has interactive navigation kiosks, and tracks equipment and optimizes room availability through 7,000 internet-of-things sensors and 2,000 IoT tags using a Siemens asset tracking system. Notably, KSB created a digital twin of its building infrastructure, enabling predictive maintenance, patient flow simulation, resource optimization, and efficient management of building systems.
The challenge for hospitals that embrace this approach lies in making the facility truly functional through change management. Smart hospitals like KSB guide staff on how to best operate in a transformed environment and explain how their roles will evolve. At the same time, they remain human-centric, guided by common sense and empathy. Small details underscore the importance of integrating technology in ways that support comfort and healing. Even the blinking light of a sensor can disrupt patient sleep.
What Can US Health Systems Do Now To Transform?
As transformative facilities emerge from existing infrastructure, health system leaders need to be strategic when overhauling their digital ecosystem. Here are three transformation strategies that leaders can use while keeping empathy at the heart of innovative decision-making:
Take a calculated leap of faith. Emerging technologies such as digital twins have enormous potential, especially as the technology matures. Plausible use cases with measurable ROI are more difficult to predict and capture, however. To fully realize the potential of emerging technologies, hospitals must prioritize strategic implementation and build the necessary infrastructure to support future adoption and optimization.
Turn experiences into actionable clinical intelligence. When redesigning hospital environments, collect measurable data on patient and staff experiences from multiple perspectives, both before and after any changes. This clinical intelligence serves a dual purpose: It drives operational improvements while demonstrating empathy, enabling leaders to refine care delivery and the workplace experience.
Define partner nonnegotiables. Healthcare leaders should establish clear priorities when choosing vendor partners — i.e., focusing on healing architecture, digital infrastructure, or sustainability. The best partners will codesign solutions, share long-term goals, and help create care environments and improve workflows that support innovation, clinical excellence, and human connection.
To dig deeper and prepare for your organization’s transformation to an IHO, check our latest report, Purposeful Tech Partnerships Unlock Healthcare Transformation. It applies the Forrester Intelligent Healthcare Organization Framework to inform technology choices and evolve partnership ecosystems. Please schedule a guidance session to learn more.
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