Top 5 Tips for your Kids Waiting Room
/Top Tips for your Waiting Room
A trip to the hospital, doctor or dentist can be a stressful for all involved, let alone if one of those in attendance is 12 years or younger. A well thought out waiting room can be a haven for families and their children as they wait in an environment they aren’t unfamiliar with. Here’s our top 5 tips for planning a children’s’ waiting room that will help set your patients at ease.
Consider Space
How much space do you have? Are you lucky enough to have a dedicated children’s waiting room or just a blank space on a wall? Space saving wall play panels require little room, are easy to install and come in a huge variety of options. They are a great way to maximise space while happily distracting your youngest patients.
If you do have more space then consider a combination of wall play panels, a free-standing item like our Sealife Bead Maze Activity Table and seating that works for both parents and children. We will happily provide recommendations based on the space you have available.
Take Hygiene Seriously
Kids waiting rooms can sometimes look like a health hazard themselves. Items such as soft toys get grubby quickly and require washing, construction bricks can have food caught in them and books look dirty and worn within a day or two. Studies have even shown that these toys can contain harmful staphylococci and dangerous coliforms.
Thankfully all our products can be cleaned easily, helping to minimise the risk of cross contamination. Wall play panels and even the IKC touch screens can be wiped down with anti-bacterial wipes daily, and our furniture fabric includes a protective finish which helps guard against stains and inhibits the growth of bacteria in healthcare environments.
Save Yourself Time
Plan a waiting area that will help save your receptionists and nurses time, without adding another task to their day. Toys such as construction bricks, puzzles, and even pens and paper need tidying numerous times a day to ensure the children’s area looks hospitable and entertaining. By providing equipment that fixes in place (like the Wilbur Wall panel) or doesn’t have loose parts (like the KeeBee Kiddie Cube) your staff will have more time to focus on patient care, rather than picking up after them.
Our products are all listed on our website, can be ordered online and will be delivered to your place of work by courier. This means shopping for play solutions is no longer an extra chore for you to take on out of hours or over weekends. We ship Australia-wide!
Do the Maths
We know it’s tricky to obtain funding or prioritise a non-essential line item on a budget. An engaging play solution for your surgery or treatment room doesn’t need to be costly and will more than pay for itself over its lifetime. Our products are all made for commercial purposes meaning you can trust them to last the distance. Our original wall play panels are regularly spotted in surgeries more than 10 years later and in great condition!
A Wilbur Wall Panel and an All the Alphabet Wall Mural will come to $395 + GST and shipping, that’s an investment of just over $1.00 per day (but know these will last much longer than a year!). Why not try them in a corner of your waiting room and see how much happier and occupied the youngest patients become?
Make it Fun and Stylish
All of our products are designed to attract the attention of kids and engage and entertain them in an unfamiliar setting. But that doesn’t mean that your children’s waiting room needs to stand out like a sore thumb and not be in keeping with the rest of your practice. Most of our products come in numerous colours, and some like the ottomans, feeding chairs, and murals can all be custom made to work with your corporate colours and branding.
Or why not consider a theme? Here are some quick and easy themes with a shopping list of items
Dentist in a beach-side town
Marine Scene wall mural
Sealife Bead Activity Maze
Under the Sea KeeBee wall panel
Wall Play Panel, yellow
City centre doctor’s surgery
City Scene wall mural
Aeroplane wall panel
Travel Town KeeBee wall panel
Nesting ottoman set in blue and orange
Finally
If you’re not sure where to start get in contact with us to book your free 15 minute phone consultation to see how we can help.