How to Design a Shipping Container Clinic
Shipping container clinics have found a massive boost in popularity after the COVID-19 pandemic. There was a shortage of hospital beds in the entire world, and the need for temporary hospitals rose to an unprecedented high. There were many types of temporary hospitals and clinics which were utilized during the fight against the corona virus, but after a while, the experts started using mobile clinics instead of temporary ones. The reason was that it was much cheaper and faster to move clinics to the next location in which they are required, rather than building or setting up a whole new hospital or clinic.
One of the best types of mobile medical care units which found great popularity was shipping container clinics. They are easily ported to anywhere they are required, and they offer a stable design which can be used from the moment they are set in the new location.But what exactly are shipping container clinics and how are they designed? The design of a medical care unit is mostly dictated by how it is used and why is it needed. Here in this article, we will talk about the questions you need to ask for you to realize what will be the best design for your shipping container clinic.
What Factors Decide the Design of a Shipping Container Clinic?
The Type of Required Service
Every mobile medical care unit goes to locations in which the specific type of service it offers are needed. It wouldn’t make sense to send a mobile dentist container unit to the site of a location where a massive fire has caused many burn injuries. The types of services which a shipping container clinic can offer vary greatly, and the need for equipment and medicine storage in each of them is very different to others. These elements mostly dictate what the interior of a shipping container clinic will look like.
The space within any medical care unit needs to keep practicality at the highest order of priority, and once the designers (who should be medical experts, or should consult medical experts for the entire design phase) are sure that all the practical elements, such as equipment placement, availability of equipment and all storage compartments, movement space for the medical staff, proper sanitation and air circulation, and many other factors are properly sorted, then if there is room left for beautifying, they can tend to those elements as well. For example, sometimes, the walls or floor might need to be made of materials which support the specific requirements of the medical care unit, but their color can be decided by a designer.
The Equipment
We have already shed some light on the importance of equipment in a shipping container clinic. In a normal hospital, a vast variety of services are offered to patients with many different types of problems. Each of those patients are referred to different parts of the hospital, where the special type of equipment they need is located. That is usually not the case with temporary or mobile hospitals. They are usually set up to meet a very urgent or specific need, or they are there to provide a very general first aid service.
Mobile medical centers are sent to a new location to fulfil a very specific need which the local hospitals of that area have difficulty providing. For providing specific services, shipping container clinics need specific equipment, and the practicality of spaces where the equipment is installed and how the medical staff can move around them and access them leaves little room for any other design element such as beautification of the shipping container clinic. Usually, it’s vital to consult professional medical experts and physicians who have expertise in that very specific field to make sure that all their needs are required. The entire point of a mobile medical care unit is to provide a specific type of medical care, and if it fails in that regard, no other design factor will cover this failure.
The Number of Shipping Containers Needed
Sometimes, a medical care unit needs multiple types of equipment which need to be close to each other, and they might not fit into a single shipping container. Shipping container clinics can be designed in a way that they are made full by the attachment of two or more shipping containers side by side. Pathways could be installed in them for easy access, or entire walls can be removed.
In other cases, the shortage is with hospital beds, just as we witnessed during the corona virus pandemic. In this case, there could be as many shipping containers used as the number of patients dictate. Not all shipping container units will have the same design. Some will serve as normal hospital beds and the required equipment. Some will serve as Intensive Care Units. Some will serve as staff rooms, and some will simply serve as corridors.
The Environment
Although the first priority of a mobile medical care unit is serving its purpose to the greatest, it cannot ignore environment conditions. You can’t provide a hospital bed for a patient in -30 degrees Celsius without your room protected by proper insulation and heating mechanisms. You can’t ignore any type of weather condition. Rain, heat, cold, and wind can all be detrimental to the condition of a patient. Insulation, heating and cooling air conditioning units, and medical air circulation units are all important factors which cannot be overlooked while designing a shipping container clinic.
Where Can You Obtain a Shipping Container Clinic From?
As we explained in this article, the design of a shipping container clinic can and does change with every single specific order. The client in these cases are almost exclusively medical experts, and it’s important to have the flexibility to be able to design and build exactly what they require. That is the reason we are confident that your project will be safe in our hands. Here in Green Box Containers, we are extremely flexible in how we can modify a shipping container unit.
Not only in medical care unit projects, but in all our projects, the client’s preferences and requirements are the most important things that we adhere to, and when it comes to shipping container clinics, we make the effort to meet every single requirement with utmost precision. After determining the equipment required in each shipping container clinic, we will prepare a 2D model.
You can change that model as much as you want, as long as the structural integrity of the structure, along with the practicality of space around the equipment are not compromised. After you confirm all the changes in the 2D model and give us the final approval, we will start the modification process, and we will check every little detail multiple times to make sure everything is in order and deliver your shipping container clinic within 30 days.
If you are considering ordering a shipping container clinic, you’re at the right place. Just contact our experts, they will be ready and happy to provide you with all the details you need.