Research note: Physical activity in pediatric healing gardens: Fid-Bau Portal

Research note: Physical activity in pediatric healing gardens

Pasha, Samira / Shepley, Mardelle M.

Highlights • We evaluated 5 pediatric hospital gardens in terms of design quality. • We conducted behavior observations and survey study to quantify levels of physical activity and garden use. • We examined the relationship between quality of design and behavioral culture of the gardens. • We identified design qualities that can lead to higher levels of physical activity.

Abstract The present research note is an extension of previous study which used a survey method to investigate barriers to garden visitation in five children's hospitals in Texas. In previous study, we found that lack of shade and comfortable seats will significantly reduce duration of garden visitation for staff, and inadequate shade significantly reduces duration and frequency of garden visitation for visitors and patients. With the findings from previous study, we used scores from garden shade maps in conjunction with scores from available hospital garden audit tools (which measured quality of garden seats, plants, layout, and amenities for children, and location) to evaluate the same five hospital gardens. Through an exploratory data analysis strategy, the gardens were scored and ranked based on their design characteristics, reported garden use, and observed garden use. The general agreement observed between these rankings suggested that quality of design, can influence levels of physical activity in pediatric hospital gardens.