Designing for the patient, the clinician and the community: The future of health infrastructure

Matthew Holmes is a chartered U.K. and French registered architect who leads Jacobs’ Global Health Infrastructure business. We caught up with him after his work helping to secure a health consulting and advisory contract for a Singapore hospital in March.

What sparked your interest in design?

I was only about 13 years old when a school friend talked about being an architect. So, I read more about it and by the time I was 14 I became focused on it as a profession.  I received my B.A. in Architecture from the University of Westminster and then my diploma in Architecture from the University of Brighton.

Initially, I worked in London for a few years working on architecture design projects. After having children, we decided to move to France, to the mountains of Grenoble in the French Alps (one of my passions has been skiing and hiking in the mountains.) I worked at an architectural firm that specialized in healthcare design. That’s where I first learned about healthcare design.

The opportunity to work with Jacobs arose when I supported a consortium project in Australia. I accepted a position at Jacobs because culturally it felt like the right fit, with a lot of growth potential. Initially, most of the work was in Australia and New Zealand but it is now around the world.

What projects did you work on in the beginning for Jacobs?

In Brisbane I took on the role of leadership for the architecture team, but my own focus was health when we secured some new projects in New Zealand. From that the health infrastructure projects grew in Australia as well. I then took the lead role as Global Technology Lead for Health Architecture at Jacobs.

So how did this grow into a market driver and how has it grown since 2020?

We started looking at what our capabilities were globally in healthcare design. Then early in the pandemic, Jacobs strategically decided to launch our global health market and I took on the role of Global Solutions Director for Health Infrastructure. The focus shifted from just health design to all those touch points in the health and built environment – everything from pre-planning, planning design, delivery, commissioning, asset management – the full life cycle.

Since then, we’ve taken on new projects globally, including in the Middle East, Asia, the U.K., and now Singapore. Canada is another region where we've been doing some research on long-term care with the University of Toronto, which I’m really excited about. I also support other projects in the U.S. helping with scope and capabilities.

What are two or three health projects or programs you are most proud of leading or managing at Jacobs?

I think the work we did in New Zealand, like the Christchurch Hospital, was outstanding, as well as the award-winning architectural services the Jacobs team delivered for the expansion of Blacktown Hospital in New South Wales and, more recently, the Women’s & Children’s Hospital in Adelaide.

In these projects, we helped the client envision what their future health facility would be by looking at their models of care, clinical service plans, and business needs to meet their goals. Another project underway that meets a wide range of needs, from social value and health equity to sustainability and community health, is the project we did in the South Pacific islands of Kiribati.

What’s the favorite part of your job?

I think I'm quite lucky in my job. I think working in health is of great value. You know you're doing the type of work that is a benefit for society, good for people. We also plan to do more on wellness initiatives to help communities be healthy.

What are some of the trends in healthcare design and infrastructure development worldwide?

A few trends come to mind:

• Looking beyond the component of infrastructure into patient care and how technology is used to deliver integrated patient data.
• Evaluating workforce requirements and how healthcare workers are able to access and transfer information – using data to bring all the components of patient care together is key.
• More emphasis on wellness and looking at that through a design/planning lens—seeing how our delivery team can help clients reduce the demand on their workforce and augment wellness.
• Climate change and decarbonization: helping health systems become more sustainable for the future. It’s part of a holistic approach to help healthcare systems with long-term capacity planning.

What are some of the challenges in delivering a major infrastructure project?

You must look farther ahead in planning – it’s not unusual on big infrastructure projects that you are looking at 7-10 years from planning to delivery. So, you have to plan for changes. When we start these projects, we are often doing demand and forecast analytics on what the market demand is going to be. So, then the challenge is managing change through the process.

How do you spend your free time? What would we most likely find you doing when you’re not working?

Anything outdoors. I like just being in the countryside, hiking through trails. I love sailing, but don’t do that as often I would like.

What do you most like about being part of #OurJacobs?

Well, I think it's the diversity of who we are and what we do – diversity in culture and diversity in capabilities and skill sets. You learn from different people.

The other part is obviously being part of an organization that brings together people who can deliver solutions for our clients. I really enjoy collaborating with our colleagues around the planet and connecting what we do.