Healing Gardens in Hospitals

For a patient, visitor, or member of staff, spending long hours in a hospital can be a stressful experience. Nearby access to natural landscape or a garden can enhance people’s ability to deal with stress and thus potentially improve health outcomes. In past centuries, green nature, sunlight and fresh air were seen as essential components of healing in settings ranging from medieval monastic infirmaries; to large municipal hospitals of the 17th and 18th centuries; to pavilion-style hospitals, asylums and sanitoria of the 19th and early 20th centuries inspired by the work of public health reformer, Florence Nightingale.