Evaluating hospital quiet time from engineering, medical, and nursing perspectives

A healthy hospital soundscape is crucial to promote healing for patients and a healthy workplace for staff. Unfortunately, the occupant-generated sounds, building systems, and medical equipment required to care for patients can create high noise levels. Rising concern has led to an increase in hospital noise studies exploring noise reduction strategies. One major issue is the gap existing between the acoustical and medical contributions necessary to solving the problem. This talk will document how our team is focusing on bridging that gap through the interdisciplinary collaboration of individuals from architectural engineering, medicine, nursing, psychology, and statistics. The project includes an 18-month longitudinal study aiming to improve Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) soundscapes through the implementation of a Quiet Time (QT) evidence-based practice change. Detailed acoustic measurements and staff surveys were collected to document the objective and subjective effects of QT. The acoustical impa...