How HKS Supports Evolving Asia Pacific Health Systems through Design
- Gordon Gn
- Sumandeep Singh
- Joey Tan
The Asia Pacific region is the fastest growing market in healthcare spending globally. Health systems are evolving to support a growing and rapidly aging population and mitigate effects of widespread public health concerns like pandemics. At the same time, digital technology and medical advancements are influencing care delivery and the design of public health infrastructure in the region like never before.
As the regional healthcare real estate market continues to surge, HKS — including our firm’s Singapore team — is bringing its talent, experience working in the region, and multidisciplinary approaches to help health systems achieve their goals. A robust team of architects, interior designers and researchers, HKS Singapore has designed and delivered more than $10 billion worth of healthcare infrastructure in China, Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, India, Pakistan, Australia and countries throughout the Middle East.
Activating HKS’ global network and rich legacy of designing world-class hospitals and clinics, our team partners with public and private sector clients to solve diverse health challenges.
Designing and Delivering Large Public Healthcare Complexes
Our team has been helping redefine healthcare excellence in Asia Pacific for more than a decade, tackling complex design and planning challenges with large-scale hospital projects throughout the region.
With the ParkwayHealth Gleneagles Shanghai International Hospital and Parkway Gleneagles Hong Kong Hospital, the team fit extensive medical programs into buildings situated within tight districts to help ParkwayHealth deliver the best-in-class care to local, regional and international patients and families. A continued partnership with ParkwayHealth has led to additional projects throughout the region and improved experiences for our client partners and their communities.
In Macau, HKS completed the medical planning of an acute care hospital district with more than 1,000 beds, 100 clinics and an extensive, cutting-edge oncology program, including a complex Cyclotron facility, as well as an accompanying life sciences laboratory. The hospital helps bridge the gap between private and public health care services in Macau. Achieving a similar goal in Beijing, HKS Singapore and Shanghai teams partnered to deliver the state-of-the-art Xiong’an Xuanwu Hospital, a comprehensive Class 3A hospital that provides essential medical services to local residents. The Xiong’an campus measures more than 280,000 square meters and has served over 45,000 outpatients since opening in 2023.
HKS Singapore teams are working with clients across South Asia and the Middle East, providing a full-service scope of architecture, medical planning and interior design services to clients. Apollo Hospitals, India’s largest private hospital network, entrusted HKS Singapore with master planning for the Hyderabad Jubilee Hills campus, a 600-bed healthcare facility and commercial development in Chennai; a 500-bed hospital in Gurugram; and the Mayapada Apollo Batam International Hospital in Indonesia. The team also delivered Novacare Hospital in Islamabad — Pakistan’s first internationally affiliated hospital — in collaboration with Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. Additional HKS efforts in these regions include Kings College Hospitals in Dubai and Jeddah, and Abdi Waluyo Hospital in Kalimantan, Indonesia. For these large, complex projects, close collaboration with project partners ensures we deliver high standards of quality, expediency and robust healthcare designs tailored for a growing region.
Enhancing Operations with Design Thinking and High-Performance Approaches
HKS brings global thought leadership and technical skills to projects throughout the Asia Pacific region to ensure the best outcomes for clients, health system patients and the environment. With a focus on Environmental, Social and Governance approaches, we seek to use our unique skills to create design innovations for health care systems and those who benefit from their services.
For the Eastern General Hospital project with Singapore’s Ministry of Health Holdings (MOHH), HKS’ research and advisory practitioners conducted design thinking workshops and a literature review, performed design diagnostics in existing institutions to identify gaps, and helped run several stages of prototyping to enable standardization of key clinical modules for the project. The team translated this research into schematic and detailed design, working alongside other consultants at the Healthcare Living Lab, a new MOHH facility built to test prototypes and house consultant teams in Singapore.
In addition to integrating strategy and research into design projects, HKS is also committed to designing and delivering quality renovation and adaptive reuse projects. These approaches support smart use of resources and limit impact on the environment while helping health systems provide world-class care.
In a renovation project of the 20-year-old Changi General Hospital, our team tackled many design and construction challenges to reconfigure critical care departments, inpatient wards and diagnostic and treatment areas. The team of medical planners and designers approached each phase with meticulous planning to integrate seamless workflows across existing and newly remodeled spaces. Beyond increasing clinical capacity, the post-COVID design response was strategically optimized to enable pandemic readiness and accommodate civil and national emergencies. In a completely different approach, the HKS Singapore team also completed ParkwayHealth Gleneagles Chengdu Hospital, by transforming an existing shopping mall into a 450-bed acute care hospital with an award-winning design that serves people throughout western China. As infrastructure ages across the region, solutions like this are providing a path forward for health clients as they seek to provide more access to care.
Leveraging Technology for 21st Century Facilities and Treatment
Through the use of emerging technologies, and seamless integration of well-established tools, we’re helping Asia Pacific health systems achieve the goals they have for hospitals and clinical care spaces.
A successful collaboration between HKS Singapore and HKS China, the BOE Hefei Digital Hospital, a sophisticated facility with two inpatient towers and a total of 1,000 beds designed and built for a technology-oriented client. The hospital excels in cardiovascular, oncology, orthopedics and neurology specialties, meeting a critical need for advanced healthcare in Hefei, a city of 7.8 million people. HKS’s design respects Chinese cultural nuances, with exam rooms accommodating patients’ relatives and dedicated spaces in the emergency department for preferred intravenous infusions. This thoughtfully designed hospital creates a welcoming, efficient setting for the community in a future-looking environment.
The Eastern General Hospital project, which is currently under construction, is the first post-pandemic hospital in Singapore for surge preparedness and is designed for automation of evolving clinical workflows. This milestone project set a new standard for acute care facilities in pandemic readiness and flexible growth in Singapore, a benchmark for future public hospitals. The project team used an immersive technology called CAVE, which HKS supported by providing live project BIM models for collaboration, issue tracking and visualization. HKS also used CAVE to present the planning and designs to diverse stakeholders including clinical users and delegations from overseas, local universities and government departments.
Coinciding with the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in healthcare operations, HKS leverages industry-leading standards on AI usage to plan and design projects, and our teams are educated in AI for healthcare as well.
Ready for the Future
Our team at HKS Singapore — which has been fully established for over a decade and remains one of the few large international design firms with a strong local presence —is committed to being an influential partner for health systems throughout Asia Pacific and across global markets. From our new, brain healthy workplace located in the Central Business District, we are engaging with various public and private institutions, partnering to change the healthcare design landscape in the region and inspiring a wave of novel solutions. We have a wealth of experience in the local context, which we combine with expertise from HKS headquarters in the United States and offices around the world to continuously improve upon the solutions we provide in the region.
As we look to the future of healthcare in Asia Pacific, we’re excited to contribute to positive growth by designing spaces that suit the real needs of clients and residents now and for many years to come.
