A comfortable design is imperative in any medical environment, including your new veterinary practice.
Vet clinics can be stressful places, not only for animals but also for owners, so it is extremely important to try and create a warm and welcoming space for everyone walking through your front door.
Animal hospital/ clinic furniture has certain differences to general medical furniture. In a place where ‘spills’ are commonplace you need to furnish in order to keep your space hygienic and comfortable for owners and their pets.
No-one wants to walk into a veterinary waiting room that is loud, smelly and decorated with chairs showing rust due to a few ‘nervous wee’s’ over the years. This kind of welcome can be very off-putting and turn people away which also means running the risk of no word of mouth recommendations.
How your patients and their humans feel when they walk into your clinic sets the mood for the entire appointment. If someone feels uncomfortable and has to wait for an extended period of time to be attended to their mood might be very different if they were to walk into a warm, welcoming space where staff members are on hand to help.
If you have a pet of your own you will know they are more like family members than pets. And because of this owners want to see a clean clinic in which they feel their pet is going to get the best care possible.
Your waiting area and animal hospital/ clinic furniture should be designed not only for sick or injured pets but also for their owners.
Think about things such as the floorplan of your waiting area and how you can utilise the space you have in order to create a calming environment.
Something such as separating this area into two sections where cats can congregate on one side and dogs on the other can make a huge difference to your clinics atmosphere and also opens up the opportunity for targeted retail areas. If you are a dog owner you probably aren’t going to be comfortable walking through a group of cats with your pup in order to have a look at the dog food but are more likely to browse if it is right next to you and easily accessible.
Not only do you want the animals to be comfortable but it is also important to make their humans comfortable by providing privacy.
Some people may not like filling out personal information or making payments right in front of everyone else waiting at reception after an appointment, therefore it is a good idea to incorporate semi-private areas into your animal hospital/ clinic furniture and/or at your reception desk where possible. It is also a good idea to make sure these areas are a decent distance away from the busiest parts of your reception counter.
A feeling of privacy can be achieved easily with smart joinery design and can incorporated into your reception desk neatly.
Staff members also need to be taken into careful consideration when it comes to comfort. Making sure you are giving them the perfect working environment will ensure they can go about their daily tasks with minimal disruption creating a smooth workflow and increased efficiency.
Happy staff is also extremely important for patients. Flustered looking staff can lead to flustered patients. Its a knock on effect, therefore by giving your staff members the right animal hospital/ clinic furniture from the beginning will go far when it comes to creating the calm and inviting environment you want for your veterinary clinic.
