An Rx for noisy hospitals
Acoustics experts take aim at sound pollution affecting patients, staff

Ilene Busch-Vishniac and James E. West, right, with microphones and an artificial head used to record stereo signals in a manner that simulates how humans hear. They are assisted in their acoustical engineering research by graduate student Colin Barnhill.

Announcements blare from overhead speakers. Electronic devices beep. Heating and cooling systems rumble. Employees and visitors speak loudly. This sound snapshot, researchers say, comes not from a factory or a sports stadium but from a typical hospital. In a new study, Johns Hopkins acoustical engineers found that hospital noise levels internationally have grown steadily over the past five decades, disturbing patients and staff members, raising the risk of medical errors and hindering efforts to modernize hospitals with speech recognition systems.
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HopkinsOne to fast-track grants segment
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