Foto: Ylva Carlqvist Warnborg
"Staff really cool down in here. The different light, the muffled sound and the nice colors in the room affect everyone who stays here, "says ICU nurse Ann-Louise Smith.
Ann-Louise works as ICU nurse at at Södra Älvborgs Hospital, where one of the ICU rooms is especially designed to create a better environment for both patients, relatives and staff.
Swedish radio recently interviewed her and Sepideh Olausson, a graduate students at the Department of Health Sciences at the University College of Borås who is involved in an ongoing research project on how staff and patients are experiencing the intensive care room.
Some of the results sofar are being discussed and the reactions are positive.
Ann-Louise explains among others how the sound environment is being perceived...
"The first thing one notices is the sound envrionment, we are so used to all sound that are present in all rooms, because of equipment and activity. The moment that you walk into this room however, one notices that it is much quieter, more comfortable. All notice that the colors and the sound environment make that it is much more pleasant in this room,we actually cool down here and we do not experience the alarms as disturbing any longer. We would definately like all rooms to be like this.
It isover 60 years ago that Sweden's first intensive care unit was opened. Since then, health care has become increasingly high tech, but the intensive care room's environment has not improved at all at the same rate as the treatment itself.
- Intensive Care Room environment is deplorable. The severely ill patients may never able to rest and recover, but it is full of whirring machines and crisp sound from anywhere, at any time of day, "says Sepideh Olausson, graduate students at the Department of Health Sciences at the University College of Borås. The contradictory with intensive care is that it is so messy that health professionals also cause patients some troubles and injuries.
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