TY - JOUR T1 - Architecture and general practice JF - British Journal of General Practice JO - Br J Gen Pract SP - 517 LP - 517 DO - 10.3399/bjgp08X319567 VL - 58 IS - 552 AU - Rod Kemsley Y1 - 2008/07/01 UR - http://bjgp.org/content/58/552/517.abstract N2 - Improving new healthcare buildings for those who use them perhaps hinges on two key areas. Firstly, how medical professionals interface with design professionals and second, how these buildings are procured.Health care is a procedurally-anchored activity especially in today's litigious and insurance-driven environment. Crucial decisions are made and are well protected by protocol.In architecture, protocol is increasingly present but the root mentality is different. Fundamentally we do not maintain preordained entities but make new ones (albeit infinitely less sophisticated) and we are trained from the outset as creative agents. There are bodies of hard scientific knowledge which impinge on what we do, how materials perform in fire, how to splice a joist, but the architect's decisive role is their synthesis with other information in the messy whole that is a building.This was highlighted by Rice et al's paper on architecture in health.1 We architects also develop an eye for the signs of deeper malaise, and the investigative tools brought to bear on this issue, akin to someone using a screwdriver to split a stout log, attracted attention. To quantify the effects … ER -