Sound Masking in a Healthcare Environment

Sound masking adds natural and articial sounds and noise into an environment. It is used to cover-up unwanted sounds that cause distractions. It creates a comfortable and ambient work environment by reducing the awareness of pre-existing sounds in the room and helps create speech privacy.

Confidentiality is important in a Healtcare Environment. A patients care and records need to be kept private. In an office setting it is common place for health care providers and staff members to discuss patients needs and records. Anyone within hearing distance is likely to pick up on these conversations, but there are also those who purposely eaves drop to find out information.

An up-to-date Heathcare facility takes measures to ensure that this information is neither inadvertantly or deliberately over-heard. Installing sound masking equipment and eaves dropping protection ensures that a patients confidentiality remain in tact.

sound masking solutions are available for floors, windows, doors, suspended ceilings, HVAC duct work and other areas that are vulnerable. These sound masking solutions should meet certain federal requirements such as the Defense Intelligence Agency Manual (DIAM), Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) and the Director of Central Intelligence Directive (DCID).

Protection from eaves dropping is acquired by a masking generator which creates a normal masking signal. It also has several other signals mixed with it. This prevents someone from purposely listening in on conversations within a healthcare invironment. Patient confidentiality is of utmost importance and should be maintained at all times. Installing eaves dropping protection and sound masking units can give an office the best of both worlds while being unintrusive to the staff.

Sound masking involves installing speakers above suspended ceilings which are aimed upwards. This will increase the spatial uniformity of the sound so that less distractions are heard from white noise. Industry experts suggest it takes about ten minutes for most people to regain their concentration after a distraction. By masking the noise in a heathcare environment the staff can pay more attention to the tasks at hand. Distractions in this kind of facility can put a patient at risk.

Statistics show that productivity levels in a work space using sound masking technology will rise anywhere from 3 to 20 percent. sound masking can cut out even small sounds like the clicking of keyboards, the tapping of an ink pen, and other office noise. Sound masking equipment will reduce the speech noise in a room as well as soften all other noise in the office environment. This keeps the human ear from hearing it as a distraction. It also keeps nearby conversation levels down so they don't pose a distraction.

In a healthcare environment using an open plan office, the Sound Transmission Class (STC) and the Noise Reduction Coefficient (NRC) must be balanced to achieve good speech privacy. This allows the background sound levels to be comfortable and maintained uniformly. Sound generating units produce random sequence sounds but not a repetitive pattern that would be noticed. Sound masking creates a harmonious atmosphere which increases people's ability to concentrate, it restores speech privacy, allows employee productivity and efficiency to increase.

Healthcare facilities should utilize sound masking units containing a step attenuator, a rotating volume control for precision in sound-level adjustment and a rotating volume control for office music that plays in the background.