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Radiology, Noise, and the Patient Experience

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jradnu.2018.10.002Get rights and content

Abstract

The patient environment in radiology laboratories and clinics has not been discussed in relationship to the noise within it and its impact on care. However, results of the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems surveys have affirmed that noise remains a challenge for patients and health care organizations. The anxieties experienced by patients, whether waiting for a diagnostic test or radiation therapy, are influenced by the environment of the radiology waiting or laboratory areas. This article discusses the role of the environment and steps that can be taken to optimize the patient experience through environmental improvement.

Section snippets

What do your patients hear?

Hardly a new issue, in a 2008 study of noise on the intensive care unit, patients were disturbed and distracted mainly due to noise from the nurses' station, visitors, and other nonclinically relevant events (Akansel and Kaymakçi, 2008). In another study that looked at obstacles to nurses providing the best care, noise was listed among other environmental stressors (Gurses & Carayon 2009).

The fact is that noise is damaging and noise in the radiology laboratory, whether the result of people or

So, what about decibels?

Early efforts to standardize noise levels in health care settings were done by the World Health Organization which first set decibel recommendations in 1999 (Deardorff, 2011). However, today, those measures, which suggest 30 to 40 dB as optimal, are neither realistic nor possible, as the hospitals are now serving greater populations and technologies. In addition, other acoustic factors, such as reverberation, how the sound travels, and where it lands, impact the perception of volume and, more

Conclusion

When Florence Nightingale took on the task of defining nursing, she had little technology to manage or depend on. Rather, it was the environment, the “sick room,” that was the most effective protocol and provided both challenges and solutions to patient morbidity and mortality. Today, we can add nursing and medical errors to the list of risks posed by a noise-laden environment. Even with digital technologies used to control drug distribution and accuracy, sound-alike drug names become almost

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Conflicts of interest: Susan E. Mazer, PhD., has no conflict of interest and has not received funding or grants regarding the submitted paper.

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