Evaluating the intensive care unit soundscape.

Abstract

The intermittent sounds in hospital wards may induce arousal among patients leading to responses such as annoyance, sleep disturbance, and cardio‐vascular reactions. The sound environment as a whole may also affect the efficiency and general health among the staff. A series of studies are being conducted by the authors to evaluate the modern hospital soundscape including occupant response. Collaborations between engineering and medicine are being utilized to assess the soundscape from both a quantitative and qualitative standpoint. This talk will focus on soundscape evaluations of intensive care units. This includes a pilot study performed in a medical‐surgical intensive care unit (ICU) of a Swedish hospital. Patients were monitored for 24 hours during their stay in the ICU and both acoustic and physiological data were simultaneously recorded. Additionally, the staff wore dosimeters and completed perception questionnaires. The methodology and analyses of these detailed acoustic measurements and preliminary subjective results will be discussed. [Work supported by ASA and Swedish FAS.]