A new approach for layout design of an emergency department in hospitals: a case from Jordan

Purpose The design of the emergency department (ED) requires high precision in the process of distributing spaces. An increase in population and continuous development during the past years caused the addition of new services, changes in patients’ numbers, movement flow and treatment procedures which makes the existing layout plan of the ED no longer appropriate for its current needs. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to generate a process of finding better alternatives for ED’s spatial planning. Design/methodology/approach The genetic algorithm method as a part of the systematic layout planning strategy was adopted for decision-making in redesigning the ED layout and finding the most appropriate alternative. This methodology was applied to a teaching hospital in Jordan to create layout alternatives with better functional dimensions. Findings The design that is based on the study of the movement of users and the relationship of spaces increases the layout performance. Research limitations/implications The structural method of this study can be adopted for different hospital designs, but the results are limited only to the study case itself because of the different factors and data for each building. Originality/value This study demonstrates the process of making the most appropriate decision to redesign the ED in the hospital; therefore, the method can be adopted in restructuring the scheme of different hospitals and evaluated, especially before implementation.