Speech privacy in multiple-bed patient rooms

Even though research has shown the multiple benefits of single-bed patient rooms in hospitals, the majority of rooms in existing hospitals are shared. To share a hospital room, means to share sensitive information with total strangers. This may cause uncomfortable situations for both patients and healthcare professionals. Furthermore, the awareness of other ears in the room could even withhold a patient from sharing important information during visiting rounds. A possible solution is the use of an adjustable soundmasking system combined with a good room acoustic design. The first aim of this pilot study was to gain insight in the importance of speech privacy in multiple-bed patient rooms in a Dutch hospital, from both patients’ and professionals’ perspectives. The second aim was to investigate the impact and acceptance of an adjustable soundmasking system in a 4-bed patient room. Room acoustic measurements were conducted to determine the physical effect of the system on speech intelligibility. Subjective measures included interviews with patients experiencing the system and a questionnaire which was used to gather information on people’s need for speech privacy in the ward. The results indicate that patients as well as healthcare professionals acknowledge the need for speech privacy in multiple-patient rooms. The installed adjustable soundmasking system significantly reduced the speech transmission index but leaves room for improvement. Acoustic software modeling was used to assess the impact of room and system adaptations. The preliminary conclusion is that implementing adjustable sound masking in multiple-bed patient rooms is promising, but further research on the perception of the patient and the acoustic properties of both the room and the system needs to be conducted.