Expert Weighting of Assessment Domains for Healthcare Buildings in Hyper-Arid Gulf Climates: An Exploratory Multi-Criteria Study

Healthcare buildings in hyper-arid climates face a design tension that assessment schemes do not arbitrate: biophilic provision favours generous glazing, while extreme and rising temperatures and the need to absorb surge demand favour a deeper, less transparent enclosure. LEED, BREEAM, WELL and GSAS each set mandatory minimums on one side of this tension, but none on both. This exploratory study weighted an assessment hierarchy for Gulf healthcare buildings through a two-round Analytic Hierarchy Process: 18 experts in architecture, medicine and psychiatry in Round 1, a focus group of eight, and a Round 2 panel of seven. Responses were collected on a nine-point scale with 5 denoting equal importance and entered directly as Saaty values. Under this procedure, Round 2 placed Environmental Sustainability (0.411) and Therapeutic Design (0.284) first, with a group consistency ratio of 0.203. Converting the responses by the printed scale labels yields a different ordering, reported in full, so the weights are specific to the procedure used. We propose a dual anchor constraint requiring minimum performance in both leading domains and two unvalidated design propositions: a convertible Majlis and an internalised biophilic envelope.