Environment

August 8, 2025, 2:29 PM

From Page 122: “The Power of Place”

From page 122: “Harmony with Nature’ is more than a figure of speech. Scientists have documented that natural environments enhance health. The Earth’s natural electro-magnet field (EMF) helps regulate and balance the body’s biological cycles. When a person is shielded from this field (or Frequency?) by spending too much time indoors OR when the background ‘noise’ of computers and electronic appliances interferes with this signal….sleeping and eating patterns are DISRUPTED, THE MIND BECOMES CONFUSED AND DISORIENTED. One of the greatest challenges of modern medicine is how to creat hospitals that, inspite of technology, DO NOT BLOCK NATURE’S HEALING POWER.

From page 122: “People have always gone to nature for retreat, comfort, and healing. In the early 1900s, patients with tuberculosis or other serious chronic diseases for which medicine did not provide a cure, commonly went to a sanitorium, to rest and, hopefully, recuperate in a beautiful place in nature. Unfortunately, nature’s restorative powers have rarely been brought to the place where patients need it most: the hospital. Scientists know a great deal about the harful effects of lead paint, radon gas, carbon monoxide, and formaldehyde-treated carpets but very little about the kind of environments that promote health. Research in healthy environments began in earnest only during the last decades of the twentieth century (1900s).”

From page 122: “A lack of attention to the healing influence of PLACE is most clearly seen in the intensive care unit (ICU). Closed windows, meant to keep drafts and germs out, also keep germs inside and happy to multiply on warm surfaces. Machines that monitor a patient’s vital signs are uncomfortably attached to his body with needles or tubes, robbing him of self-reliance, self-control, and self-confidence. His environment is filled with odd-colored lights from monitors; the beeps, clicks, and buzzes of machinery that seem to be sounding an alarm even when they are not; the chatter of nurses and doctors; the moans of other patients; and many unpleasant or disturbing smells.”

From page 122: “Alice Ware Davidson, Ph.D., R.N., writing in the science newsletter Bridges, has documented the adverse effects of this toxic environment. She notes that ICUs ‘have high levels of sensory interference that can interfere with sleep and impair mental functioning.’ She discusses how when a group of cardiac ICU patients were allowed to recuperate in an environment of reduced light and noise, their blood pressure and skin temperature were more normal than controls.”

From pages 122-123: “Davidson compared a new cancer care center with the rpevious oncology unit in a major hospital. “Both quantitative and qualitative methods were used to collect data for three months to compare the new Cancer Care Center (CCC) to the previous Oncology Unit (OU) (before it closed!).” The CCC was quiet and beautiful and had kitchen facilities where the family could cook meals for or with the patient. As expected, Davidson found that the harmonious environment of the CCC led to a greater sense of well-being, care, and comfort for patients and their families. ‘In addition, there was no statistically significant difference in cost per patient day between the OU and the CCC. And patients had a shorter length of stay in the CCC than on the OU.”

rk comment: The bean-counters (money people) probably were not happy with the “ shorter length of stay” because the patient’s bill would have been lower!

From page 361: (see endnote #10 on page 361: Alice Ware Davidson, Ph.D., R.N., “Healthcare Environments and Their Relationship to Human Well-Being,” Bridges, 5, no. 2 (summer 1994, pages 15-17).

From page 123: “The influence of an aesthetic hospital environment was also reported by Roger S. Ulrich in his article ‘View through a Window May Influence Recovery from Surgery,’ published in the journal Science. Ulrich examined the records of forty-six (46) patients who, while recovering from gallbladder surgery, had been ramdomly assigned rooms that faced either trees or brick walls. Patients in both groups were matched by age, gender, and both past and present health status and were cared for by the same nurses. Those whose rooms faced TREES required less medication, healed more quickly, and were released earlier.”

From page 123: “It makes good scientific sense that the experience of beauty, even in a hospital, can improve health. A beautiful environment creates a positive mood, which stimulaes the release of HEALTH-ENHANCING BIOCHEMICALS CALLED ENDORPHINS. It also encourages families to spend more time with patients. Lack of isolation and a feeling of love and support increase patients’ expectations of healing (placebo effect) and create better therapeutic outcomes.”

From page 361: (See endnote #12 on page 361:

(see endnote #11 on page 361: Roger S. Ulrich, 'View through a Window May Influence Recovery from Surgery,' Science 224 in 1984, on pages 420-421.

“Hospitals are beginning to take these facts to heart. Some hospitals, such as the California Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco and Longmont United Hospital in Longmont, Colorodo, are trying to create spa-like environments, with painted walkways; rooms with earth-tone walls and wooden floors and decorated with natural fibers; areas for meditation; and a variety of complementary therapies. Old ideas about the irrelevance of PLACE are slowly dying out.”

rk comment/question: Were hospitals attempting to LURE PEOPLE AWAY FROM NATURAL HEALING ENVIRONMENTS?