Improving Acoustics to Improve a Patient’s Healing Experience

Doctors, nurses, medicine, technology, patients, family, specialists, the list of factors that contribute to the swift and successful recovery of someone admitted to a hospital is seemingly endless. There is, however, one element that is virtually always present but often overlooked as a source of healing: the hospital building itself.

Acoustical comfort is a specific element that plays a key role in both the healing process and the overall productivity of the staff working in the facility.

The Three H’s
The studies are numerous regarding the importance of noise control within a health care facility. To reinforce the importance, refer to the three H’s: HCAHPS, HIPAA and Healing.

• HCAHPS: HCAHPS refers to the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems survey. This is an attempt to measure customer satisfaction across health care providers in a consistent manner. The higher the level of scores an institution achieves may affect their level of reimbursement. These scores have become a primary focus of many hospital administrators for obvious reasons. Within this survey is a specific question regarding the noise level inside a patient’s room. Specifically it reads: “During this hospital stay, how often was the area around your room quiet at night?”
• HIPAA: HIPAA refers to Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, which has impacted a variety of patient confidentiality issues, and including the noise level in any area within a medical facility where a patient’s information is being discussed aloud. The acoustics of the facility play a critical role in controlling the audibility of this confidential information.
• Healing: Lastly, and most importantly, is healing. The data regarding noise control and its positive effect on healing is overwhelming and can be traced back as far as 1859 when Florence Nightingale stated in her book Notes on Nursing: “Unnecessary noise is the most cruel abuse of care which can be inflicted either on the sick or the well.”

If we want to provide a space that gives a person the optimum opportunity to heal, then noise must be controlled, providing a quiet space that allows doctors, nurses and patients the ability to clearly communicate with each other and offers the requisite privacy everyone deserves when discussing their personal health.

Understanding the True Impact

Acoustical comfort is intangible. Imagine taking a young child who is in need of medical attention to the hospital. You do not know the exact cause of the child’s ailment, but you know he or she is in need of help.

When you arrive at the hospital with your sick child, you may enter a waiting room or emergency room that is filled with people. In a situation where a loved one is sick or injured and the remedy is unknown, most people tend to become somewhat anxious. If the crowded waiting room is filled with people and noise, anxiety can mount and additional strain is placed on everyone. As the surrounding space grows louder, you speak louder – this is known as the Lumbar Effect.

Then you are asked to complete the appropriate paperwork for admittance into the medical facility. This may include insurance information, medical history and symptoms. Is this private information staying private, or are the acoustics of the space such that others may overhear you discussing this confidential information?

You are then met by a doctor or nurse who examines the child to confirm symptoms and you are asked many questions to help ascertain the extent of the illness or injury. Imagine if you are unable to clearly hear these questions, or if the doctor mishears your response. This could affect the proper diagnosis and prevent or delay proper recovery. The same could be said if a doctor’s prescribed treatment or medication is misheard by the nurse, which could result in the wrong medication being given to your child in an emergency situation.

If your child’s illness or injury is deemed necessary to require an overnight stay in the hospital, acoustical comfort and control remains a critical part of their recovery process. Once in a room, is he or she able to sleep well that night? Imagine all of the sounds in a hospital that is in operation 24 hours a day, 365 days a year:
• The patient next door who is in distress
• Public address announcements over the hospital intercom system
• Trays and gurneys with wheels that are out of alignment clattering down the hall
• Irregular equipment noises and alarms
• Doctors, nurses or visitors talking loudly in the hallways

If your child does not have a good night’s rest, their recovery time may be greatly extended due to an interruption in the body’s natural healing process. This impacts not only the child, but also the entire family.

Improving Comfort through Building Materials

The need to control noise in a healing space to maximize acoustical comfort is evident, but there are many ways to achieve a desired level of quiet through the building materials used in the structure itself. In considering noise and its relationship to the building materials, consider the building as you would the human body: as a series of systems that work in harmony. The walls and partitions are systems that interact with the ceiling, floor and openings such as doors and windows. Components of these systems that help maximize acoustical comfort include:
• The use of high-quality sound-absorbing ceiling tiles
• Sound-control drywall
• Viscoelastic polymers utilized between layers of wallboard: When this type of compound is sandwiched between two rigid layers of material (like drywall), it forms a damping system so that when sound waves pass through the structure, the sound energy is dissipated in the form of heat
• Proper use of sustainable insulation in the wall cavity: to significantly improve acoustical performance, interior walls should be insulated; the empty space between the wallboard faces should be completely filled with insulation to help eliminate air gaps, as any gap in an acoustical construction will also leak sound
• Sustainable Insulation is a category of insulation that is produced in a highly energy-efficient manner with “best-in-class” waste and water processes, and contains no added formaldehyde, acrylic, dyes or unnecessary fire retardants; it exceeds strict indoor air quality requirements and saves up to 12 times as much energy in its first year as the energy used to produce it
• High-quality doors used in the partition with a high sound transmission class (STC) rating

In conclusion, the physical health care space is omnipresent, so it is critical that health care designers and building specifiers consult with the manufacturers of the products selected to insure each will work in harmony as a system to create a space that will maximize the healing opportunity for the patients served.

Lucas J. Hamilton is the manager for Building Science Applications at CertainTeed and Douglas W. Nyberg is the business development manager for Vertical Markets at Saint-Gobain and CertainTeed.