In 2006, I presented a peer-reviewed paper on aged care design at the 5th National Conference on Ageing in Sydney.
Entitled, ‘Happy campers? Investigating the interface between older people and retirement village environments’, this paper won a Research Prize, University of Sydney, Faculty of Architecture, Design and Planning.
The paper was the result of a series of research studies conducted on a consultancy basis for Aevum Limited, a key company in the retirement village and aged care sector at the time. The research found that a mismatch existed between many aspects of environmental design and the needs and capabilities of older people. It is well known that there is a higher level of disability among older people and often the design of retirement and aged care facilities doe snot adequately address the issues facing older people.
My paper detailed a number of the environmental design issues facing older people and included environmental design recommendations for improvement. To their credit, Aevum Limited implemented a number of recommendations highlighted in the paper.
You can download a PDF of the paper from my profile page on Academia.Edu
