Nursing News:
Research shows noise in hospitals is ³so high it threatens patientsı recovery

Noise levels on hospital wards, which can sometimes exceed the volume of a jack hammer, are hindering patientsı recovery, according to a new study. Research in the United States and Scotland has found that the use of machinery with bleeps, alarms and other electronic sounds, combined with the noise of conversation and people moving around, can raise the volume on wards to as high as 113 decibels - exceeding the 110 decibels typically generated by a jack hammer. Patients are kept awake by the din, impairing their ability to recover.
The study, conducted by staff at St Maryıs Hospital in Rochester, Minnesota, also found that a portable X-ray machine used on wards generated 98 decibels of noise, the equivalent of a motorcycle. Telephones and bedside alarms, which registered 80 decibels, were as loud as heavy truck traffic. Dawn Gasser, a nurse at the hospital, who spent a night on its surgical thoracic ward as research for the study, said that her sleep had been disturbed by interruptions including the ³roar² of a chest tube, a pump alarm and a talkative nurse. ³At about 3.15am a technician wheeled a portable X-ray machine into the room and parked it at my roommateıs bedside. It sounded like an oversized power tool as its motor whirred and the cartridges of X-ray film bumped noisily together.²
The noisiest time was at 7am, when noise levels reached 113 decibels, caused by the commotion of a staff shift changeover combined with the noise of electronic equipment. The hospital has responded with measures to reduce the noise and improve patientsı sleep. Staff changeovers now take place in an enclosed room, nightly X-ray times have been brought forward to 10pm instead of 3am. Flashlights rather than overhead lights are used for illumination.
Cheryl Cmiel, who led the hospitalıs research team, said she hoped that the findings, published in the American Journal of Nursing, would be acted upon by other hospitals. ³It is worth the effort. Reductions of even a few decibels can improve sleep and help patients get the rest they need to heal,² she said. Research in Britain has reached similar conclusions. David MacKenzie, a lecturer at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, said that he had found excessively high noise levels in Scottish hospitals. His research team monitored noise in the intensive care and the high dependency units in the former Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and also in the intensive care unit of the cityıs Western General Hospital.
Noises exceeding 90 decibels, as loud as a lawnmower, were recorded on several occasions. The causes included trashcan lids slamming, chairs scraping, alarms bleeping, telephones ringing, trolleys rattling, staff talking, ventilators hissing, and even ring binders snapping shut.
³The noise levels were incredible,² said Mr MacKenzie. ³As I was walking around a surgeon came up and said he wished we would look at his ward as the noise was affecting his heart patients.² A spokesman for the Patientsı Association said that it had received complaints about the levels of hospital noise. ³There should be an allocated time where patients have complete rest and peace,² she said. Peter Wakeham, the director of the Noise Abatement Society, said that televisions, mobile telephones and piped music in waiting areas were also causing annoyance to out-patients.
A spokesman for NHS Estates said that the Department of Health was considering a review of its guidance on noise levels.