Malawi Health & Design Collaborative

Today, unique challenges confront Malawi’s public infrastructure. Rapid urbanization and population growth stress aging health, education and urban systems.

Solving these challenges require nimble but resilient, multi-institutional collaborations imbued with deep local knowledge and inspired by global opportunity.

The Malawi Health and Design Collaborative believes a symbiotic relationship exists between health and design, where health-centered research guides spatial design methodologies, and architectural, infrastructural, and geospatial design are social indicators of health and healing.

Who We Are

The Malawi Health and Design Collaborative is a team of academics, architects and health professionals committed to strengthening Malawi’s health and education infrastructure through rigorous evidence-based research and design.

What We Do

We leverage academic and professional partners to strengthen health infrastructure with innovative programming, environmental performance analysis, and human-centered, evidence-based design.

We form an innovative, multi-institutional center for groundbreaking research, design and implementation.

We strengthen academic institutions through equitable partnerships and real-world experiences for Malawian students in architecture and the health professions.

Mission

The Health and Design Collaborative anchors new frontiers of teaching and research, designing long-term models of impact for Malawian health, education, and human development.

Projects & Research

Two research streams structure the Health and Design Collaborative research and design engagements:

Impacting Healthcare – working hand in hand with the University of Malawi College of Medicine, Kamuzu Central Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital, and the Malamulo Mission Hospital to achieve impactful solutions specific to Malawi healthcare providers.

Impacting Public Health – the Collaborative designs solutions to public health crises found in urban informal settlements. These spatial contexts, the result of rapid population growth and unplanned rural to urban migration, are the nexus of Malawi’s public health crises; and where MHDC population health and geospatial designers collaboratively innovate solutions.

Examples below:

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Intentions

Generate meaningful impact in the health and well-being of the Malawian population.
Strengthen public infrastructure systems (architecture, health, education, planning).
Foster equitable academic partnerships to strengthen the design and health professions.
Leverage social health indicators and clinical research to inform built environment strategies.
Achieve quality improvement in patient and staff outcomes through design.

Capabilities

Human-centered design and program development
Systematic literature review informing best design practice
Strategic planning and visioning conceptual development
Drone-based site analysis, data-collection and documentation
Infection control and indoor air quality analysis and strategic implementation
Sustainable design and assemblies research and detailing
Building performance analysis (daylighting, passive thermal performance, ventilation)
Post-occupancy evaluation and assessment

Methods & Impact

Health and Design Collaborative impacts are measured at human, community, systems, and policy scales. The work is guided by the UN Sustainable Development, WHO, NIH, CDC, World Bank and USAID targets, medical literature, human-centered design models, and Government Strategic Implementation Strategies.

“You want to save lives in Malawi? Build better hospitals.”

The Global Studio

Africa’s population will likely double in the next 30 years. College of Architecture and the Built Environment’s professor Chris Harnish has enlisted his students to explore how design can solve issues this growth poses to the healthcare system in Malawi.

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