Hospitals offering family-centered health care say the best way to make a patient healthy is to include the whole family

Our ongoing project By Design looks at the architecture of health care from the physical and visible, to the psychological and familial. Today our conversation includes a debate on policies to allow loved ones to be present during resuscitation.

The care Canadians receive in hospitals is always changing. And not just because of scientific advance. As part of our series By Design, we're looking at how many hospitals are adopting new ways to focus not just on patients, but on their families as well.

When Wendy Mckenzie's husband was in hospital at South Health Campus in Calgary, a new pilot program made a big difference to her. She says she was grateful to be with her husband when he was being resuscitated but says she was also left traumatized.

Allowing family members to be present in resuscitation rooms is becoming more commonplace ... part of designing hospital care that's more patient and family centered.

• Joanne Ganton is the manager of Patient and Family Centered Care at South Health Campus in Calgary, where Wendy McKenzie's husband was treated.

• James Downar is a Critical Care and Palliative Care Physician at the University Health Network in Toronto. He is also the current chair of the Postgraduate Education Committee of the Canadian Society of Palliative Care Physician.

If you've had a hospital experience where you felt the care was designed with the family in mind...or if you had an experience in hospital and felt it was lacking that attention... let us know.

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This segment was produced by The Current's Sarah Grant.