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Smart patient rooms are arriving; however, their value has yet to be explored. We interviewed 20 patients in a rehabilitation hospital, which has patient rooms equipped with off-the-shelf smart home technologies, so the entertainment and environment are digitally controllable. This novel implementation supports varying control abilities through touchscreen, voice command, and accessibility controllers. The smart rooms and controls are potentially transformative for patients with reduced motor function, helping them regain lost independence and control of their surroundings. Through semi-structured interviews, we explore how smart home technology deployed in patient rooms: interacts with patients’ needs, presents new challenges, and fits into the hospital context. We identify a range of considerations that inform how hospitals can integrate smart technology into their environment, including technology design considerations and adjustments to how hospital staff supports its use. These results take an important step toward understanding and improving the value of smart patient rooms.
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This content will become publicly available on October 3, 2026
The Smart Patient Room
The shift to digital healthcare, coupled with advancements in smart technology, has transformed hospital environments, leading to smart patient rooms (SPRs). To improve the patient and hospital employee experience, SPRs are implementing smart environment (e.g., lights, blinds, and temperature control) and entertainment (e.g., smart TVs and soundbars) technologies that can be controlled through standard switches and remotes or touch, voice, or other accessibility controls on Android and iOS app-enabled devices. This chapter explores the concept of SPRs within the broader context of smart hospitals, detailing how smart home technologies are integrated into patient care settings. Through a case study, this chapter examines the implementation and impact of one hospital’s implementation of SPRs on patients and the healthcare staff. Our findings show that SPRs offer increased autonomy for patients with other benefits and drawbacks for healthcare professionals. However, adopting commercially available smart technologies in medical settings presents challenges, including usability concerns, integration and reliability issues, and potential privacy and security risks. By contextualizing SPRs within the evolution of smart healthcare, smart hospitals, and smart homes, this chapter aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of the opportunities and limitations of SPRs. The findings underscore the need for continued user-centered design research to ensure SPRs fulfill their potential for modern healthcare.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2146420
- PAR ID:
- 10679156
- Publisher / Repository:
- IOS Press
- Date Published:
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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