Healthcare
Getting to care is part of care
Hospitals and healthcare environments are places where every journey matters. They are also among the most complex to navigate. Staff move through these spaces with urgency, while patients and visitors arrive from diverse cultural backgrounds, often vulnerable, under stress or unfamiliar with their surroundings. In these settings, effective wayfinding is vital for better outcomes, clinical performance, and public trust.
We design wayfinding systems that improve access, reduce stress, and help deliver better healthcare.
We partner with health authorities, major hospital campuses, and regional medical facilities to co-design and implement systems that support greater healthcare. Our approach aligns strategy, governance, and long-term maintenance to ensure the systems we create continue to perform as facilities grow and services evolve.
As a leader in healthcare wayfinding, we combine experience with compassion, designing systems that ensure everyone has confidence in their care journey.
Featured Work
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OurApproach
Carefinding®
Intro to Carefinding®
Carefinding® is an integrated approach to co-design, quality improvement, and governance in healthcare wayfinding.
Healthcare environments evolve constantly. To remain effective, wayfinding systems must do the same. Cygnus has defined a strategic, systems-based approach to healthcare wayfinding called Carefinding® — a framework that embeds wayfinding management into the operational fabric of healthcare organizations. Carefinding® recognizes that helping people arrive, orient, and access care is part of the care itself. It brings together high-level design thinking, governance strategy, and quality improvement processes to create resilient, responsive wayfinding systems.
OUR PARTNERSHIPS
Testimonials
We have benefited greatly from the collaboration with Cygnus as our industry partner in this work. Recognizing that how people find their way is part of the care we provide rather than something that happens before and after we meet them is now fundamental to our approach.
Michael Suddes
Site Director, Foothills Medical Centre
Our experience with Cygnus Design Group in developing the wayfinding strategy for the New St. Paul’s Hospital has been positive...It has been a pleasure working with the Cygnus team, and we appreciate the creativity and expertise they bring to our project.
Clayton Wong
Project Manager, Design & Project Delivery St. Paul’s Redevelopment Project
Cygnus has designed a thoughtful and sustainable [wayfinding] program... reducing stress on visitors navigating through the facilities, and promoting more positive health care visits, particularly as our sites increase in size and complexity.
Diana Smith
Provincial Manager, Design & Technical Services, Alberta Health Services
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Our national experience
Four decades of experience from new construction of major health centres, expansions to regional hospitals, and wayfinding strategy for existing facilities and health campuses.
| Project | Year |
|---|---|
| Trillium Health Partners Mississauga Hospital | 2025 |
| Foothills Medical Centre | 2025 |
| Kysen Regional Hospital | 2024 |
| Arthur J.E. Child Comprehensive Cancer Centre | 2023 |
| BC Children’s & BC Women’s Hospital | 2022 |
| Royal Alexandra Hospital | 2021 |
| CapitalCare Norwood | 2021 |
| Grande Prairie Regional Hospital | 2021 |
| Jim Pattison Children's Hospital | 2020 |
| Grey Nuns Community Hospital | 2020 |
| Misericordia Community Hospital | 2018 |
| Humber River Hospital | 2013 |
Industry Leadership
Connect with us
As one of our Principals overseeing Cygnus' healthcare portfolio, Michelle Parcels brings more than two decades of experience guiding hospitals and health networks through strategic change with collaborative, stakeholder-informed design.
