by Agostina Ferrentino, Clara Rius, and Ramón Torrents Introduction: Space for music The hospital is one of the most acoustically demanding environments that exist. Medical equipment, alarms, conversations and continuous activity generate noise levels that affect both rest and the emotional state of patients and staff. For decades, healthcare design has focused on minimising this impact […]
hospital acoustics
LEED-ing the way in hospital acoustics
Growing up with parents that are also doctors, Pooja Ganatra – a sustainability and acoustic consultant for Buro Happold – spent much of her youth in hospitals. During this time, she witnessed the challenges poor acoustics imposed on patients and hospital workers first-hand. This inspired her to conduct research on this important subject, which she […]
The sound of absorption – an experience!
How would you explain the experience of good sound absorption in a room? To truly understand the value of better acoustics you need to experience it firsthand. This is why we have built two identical rooms with different absorption in our showroom Ecorama at the Ecophon headquarters in Hyllinge, Sweden. Here you can experience the […]
Modular operating rooms provide good acoustics for surgeons
Lego construction for operating rooms Modular operating rooms are being seen more and more on the market. It takes less time to get it up and running compared to a traditionally built hospital. It´s cost-effective, time-saving, and can be taken down and moved when it´s not needed anymore. However, it can negatively affect acoustics due […]
Hospital Soundscapes and ways to heal them
The hospital soundscapes “The soundscape of the average modern hospital is a cacophony of overlapping beeps, blats, and pings from monitors, roaring ventilation systems, raucous bursts of conversation from visitors, patients and the nursing station, carts rumbling down hallways, televisions, phones. Sleep, essential to the healing process, is available primarily through medications. Even medicated sleep […]
International Congress on Acoustics 2019
The German Acoustical Society (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Akustik, DEGA) hosted the 23rd International Congress on Acoustics in the beautiful and historical city of Aachen in September 2019 The technical program included plenary, distinguished, invited, contributed, and poster papers covering all aspects of acoustics. There was also an extensive technical exposition highlighting the latest advances […]
BNAM 2018 Reykjavik
Did you miss out on the Baltic-Nordic Acoustic Meeting (BNAM 2018 Reykjavik )? Here are the major take-aways from a healthcare acoustics perspective. Harpa Iceland has it! Impressive nature, impressive people – and the impressive Harpa Concert and Conference Centre. Harpa is one of Reykjavik‘s greatest and distinguished landmarks. It is a cultural and social […]
Healthcare acoustic highlights from ICSV24
This summer the 24th International Congress on Sound and Vibration (ICSV24) was held in London (23 – 27 July 2017). I already published a general blog post about it, and one post about office acoustics highlights (here). In this one, I dig into the world of healthcare acoustics. Below I compiled shortly the main content from the […]
The healing sounds of music
Can music therapy improve the sound environment for patients in hospitals? And how does it affect the patient experience when a healing sound environment is present? We’ve invited US-based Anne Taylor, CEO of Scandic Health and Registered Nurse. Scandic Health is offering music therapy, MusiCure – Music as Medicine, which is composed by the Danish […]
Danish project on hospital acoustics continues with funding from Danish Sound Innovation Network
Thea Mathilde Larsen, Research Assistant at DTU (Technical University of Denmark), has recently defended her master thesis project ‘Study of Room Acoustics and Noise at Bispebjerg and Frederiksberg Hospital’, on two Danish projects. A study aimed to investigate the need for improving room acoustics in hospitals along with investigating staff’s opinion of the noise problem. […]
