PROCEEDINGS of the23rd International Congress on Acoustics
9 to 13 September 2019 in Aachen, Germany

A preliminary study of desirable sound environments in hospitalwards
Junko MATSUMOTO1
1Nagano College of Nursing, JapanABSTRACTThis study explored the desirable sound environment in hospital wards. We surveyed 111 chief nurses in
hospital wards in Japan regarding the problems concerning sounds in the hospital wards for the staff andpatients, the attempts taken to improve sound environment, and the desirable sound environment in hospitalwards. Survey results revealed that the staff was annoyed by voices of the patients talking on a mobile phone
and the noises such as snoring from the patients, voices of other staff, and noises from the transportation ofmedical equipment. Respondents felt that the patients were also annoyed by voices of other patients, voices ofthe staff, the noises such as snoring from other patients, the noises from a TV or a radio, and alarm sounds.
With respect to the attempts taken to improve the sound environment, respondents indicated that the staff haspaid close attention to voices of their own, used background music or radio, and changed the room among
patients. As a desirable sound environment in hospital wards, it was silent and comfortable. These results
suggest that staff’s attention to sounds may be useful in improving the sound environment in hospital wards.
Keywords: Noises, Hospital Wards, Sound Environment

1. INTRODUCTION
Understanding the problems in the design of hospital wards is essential for improving their soundenvironment [1, 2, 3, 4]. One way in which medical professionals have attempted this is reducing noises inhospital wards [1, 5, 6, 7]. One of the more useful approaches for reducing noises in hospital wards isusing background music, and this approach is effective in masking noises. However patients’ healthconditions, adequateness of music to scenes (time and space), and preferences of music among patientsare assumed to affect effectiveness of background music.
Also, what kind of sound environment in a hospital ward was appropriate was not clear. Research
indicated many kinds of noises in hospital ward, sound levels, and attempts for reducing noises so far.
In this study, we explored not only problems concerning sounds in the hospital wards for the staff
and patients, and attempts taken to improve sound environment, but what kind of sound environment
in hospital wards was desirable.

2. METHOD
2.1 Respondents
Respondents were chief nurses in hospitals in Nagano Prefecture in Japan.
.
2.2 Questionnaire
We made a questionnaire consisted the following: the problems concerning sounds in the hospitalwards for the staff and patients, the attempts taken to improve sound environment, and the desirable
sound environment in hospital wards.
2.3 Procedure
We asked the director in 132 hospitals in Japan for cooperating the survey. After the directors
consented to the survey, we sent a questionnaire to 200 chief nurses in 43 hospitals, and asked to1

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matsumoto@nagano-nurs.ac.jp

filling out the questionnaire and to send back it to us.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
111 chief nurses sent back a questionnaire. Many of them were in hospital wards of internal
medicine, recuperation or psychiatry which were below 60 beds.
3.1 The problems concerning sounds in the hospital wards for the staff
Results revealed that the staff was annoyed by voices of the patients talking on a mobile phone andthe noises such as snoring from the patients (41.44%) firstly. Respondents also answered voices ofother staff (26.13%) and noises from the transportation of medical equipment, a bed, a wagon, or ameal service cart (20.72%).
3.2 The problems concerning sounds in the hospital wards for the patients
Respondents supposed that the patients were annoyed by voices of other patients (56.76%) firstly.
They also answered that voices of the staff (39.64%), the noises such as snoring from other patients(19.82%), the noises from a TV or a radio (19.82%), and alarm sounds (18.92%) annoyed thepatients.
3.3 The attempts taken to improve sound environment
Respondents indicated that the staff has paid close attention to voices of their own (39.64%).
They have used background music or radio (18.92%), and changed the room among patients(18.02%).
3.4 The desirable sound environment in hospital wards
As a desirable sound environment in hospital wards, respondents answered that it was a silent andcomfortable (27.93%).

4. CONCLUSIONS
Many of the problems concerning sounds in a hospital ward occurred from the location of therooms for patients and the nurses’ station, the decrepit construction of a hospital, and the conditionsof the patients. Among some of the problems, there were the sounds which the staff needed to hear.
Therefore, we supposed that it was difficult to improve many of the problems concerning sounds
in hospital wards by the staff only. However, it was supposed that the staff could improve theproblems such as voices of the staff by paying close attention to them. Moreover, because there werea few hospital wards which were not many of the problems concerning sounds, we need toinvestigate the characteristics of such hospital wards.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 26350018.

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