Evaluating patient and staff perceptions of soundscape conditions within three hospitals

Abstract

Hospitals can present challenging soundscapes due to the continuous activity found within these environments. Routinely, this leads to poor perceptions of acoustical conditions from both patients and staff, such as in nationally reported HCAHPS patient surveys or hospital-administered staff surveys. In fact, it has been found that patient satisfaction of in-room soundscape conditions is highly related to the overall hospital rating and that staff job performance and satisfaction can be negatively affected by the acoustical environments in which they work. This research addressed these issues by collecting acoustical measurements within 38 patient rooms from 11 units of three individual hospitals, comparing results with patient and staff survey information. Data collected included 24-h occupied sound monitoring of patient rooms and nursing stations, unoccupied BNL sound levels from 20 patient rooms, and impulse response measurements of hospital unit hallways. Results from statistical analyses between measured acoustical data and patient/staff surveys will be reported, along with lessons learned applicable across all three hospitals. Taken as a whole, this study provided new insights into patient and staff perceptions of hospital noise, and could ultimately aid in the design process of new hospitals to improve patient and staff satisfaction.