Implications of a Decentralized Postpartum Unit Design and Clinical Operations.

Objectives: This postoccupancy study sought to understand whether a decentralized unit design supported a postpartum care delivery model by evaluating nurses' efficiency, staff perception, acoustical conditions, and patient satisfaction.

Background: Today, standardization and decentralization design concepts are being applied to all types of inpatient unit. There have been many studies that investigated how these concepts influence care delivery on medical-surgical units, but no study has evaluated a postpartum unit.