This post explores the major forces shaping healthcare today and the importance of the L.I.F.E. Concept in helping health systems build and maintain the right balance of staff, equipment, services, and physical space to meet the needs of their communities.
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In theory, if a health system could accurately know its community demographics and the associated percentage of illness and wellness needs, and if it also understood key variables such as the average number of services provided per healthcare worker and the amount of space required per procedure or staff member, then it could develop an algorithm that continuously updates and provides a conceptual overview of projected market needs.
Such a tool could directly correlate community health demand with required staffing levels, medical equipment inventories, and building space across the entire health system.
Of course, in the real world, these numbers can never be known exactly. Yet even approximate models can give leadership valuable insights to help build consensus around a shared future vision for the organization.
The L.I.F.E. Concept
The L.I.F.E. Concept was first introduced in earlier posts:
In truth, the L.I.F.E. Concept has been a primary driver behind much of Syntec’s and BuildUSA’s work. Originally developed in 1983–1984, it grew out of my personal awareness of the healthcare industry, a growing respect for the power of standardization across industries, and an ongoing series of discussions (and sometimes arguments) with my father—a family practice physician.
The L.I.F.E. framework provides a visual model for how health systems can balance their mix of services to better align with the illness and wellness needs of the communities they serve.
From Concept to Practical Model
Theoretically, if a health system had reliable demographic data and a solid understanding of illness-to-wellness service ratios for that population, it could integrate these with internal operational metrics—such as services per healthcare worker and space requirements per procedure or staff member.
This combination could form a living algorithm, one that continuously updates to provide a dynamic view of projected service demand and how it directly links to staffing, medical equipment, and facility space needs.
Adding a Facility Condition Assessment (FCA) to that algorithm—detailing the amount, type, and condition of existing space, staff, and equipment—would further enhance its accuracy. The resulting model could serve as a powerful decision-support tool for healthcare leadership, guiding strategic planning and capital allocation.
Although developing such a system requires significant upfront investment, it could be maintained organically through properly organized existing processes such as:
- Standard work orders
- Environment of Care (EOC) compliance
- Accreditation protocols
- Project management policies and workflows
Again, while perfect accuracy is impossible, the insights generated would be invaluable for long-term system planning and consensus building.
Origins and Evolution
This type of logistical modeling was the starting point for the L.I.F.E. Concept. Somewhere in a box, there are still 5¼-inch floppy disks containing SuperCalc (the pre-Excel spreadsheet application) files, Syntec’s early attempts at organizing the exact variables for these analyses. The composite image below shows several of those early efforts.
Today, the healthcare industry faces a mix of angst and optimism. Every level of society; home, community, state, and nation, is experiencing stress driven by political, social, and economic forces. These pressures will evolve, but the current environment highlights the enduring value of what both BuildUSA and the L.I.F.E. Concept represent: clarity, standardization, and adaptability.
The Link Between L.I.F.E., STWs, and Optimized Building
Standards, Templates, and Workflows (STWs) have long been central to BuildUSA and the Optimized Building framework. However, these ideas first originated with the development of the L.I.F.E. Concept, particularly during the programming phase of healthcare projects, when determining the correct project requirements is the critical goal.
These principles crystallized during two healthcare projects in the Chicago metro area in the 1980s, where I led the programming and planning phases.
- One was a new building featuring an Emergency Department on the first floor with medical offices and ambulatory spaces on five upper levels.
- The second was a multi-department renovation combined with a new ICU and SICU addition.
I was young, about 30, and leading weekly meetings with leadership teams from both healthcare institutions, often with 10 to 20 professionals at the table. It was a shock to my system, both in scope and responsibility, but it was also where many of the foundational ideas behind L.I.F.E., standardization, and optimized building first took root.
Photo by Jan Huber on Unsplash