National Acoustical Consultants for Health Care Acoustics LEED Certification

New LEED certification standards for acoustic environments in health care were issued in version 2.2 of the Green Guide for Health Care released January 2007. These new standards seek to provide building occupants with a healing environment free of disruptive levels of sound. Environmental Quality Credit 9.1 was added to address the acoustical issues of exterior noise, acoustical finishes, and room noise levels. EQ Credit 9.2 addresses the additional acoustic concerns of sound isolation, paging and call systems, and building vibration. Each of these LEED credits specifies acoustic standards for health care environments that require proper acoustical design and sound and vibration measurements.

Although meeting the health care speech privacy criteria of EQ Credit 9.2 will not shield health care organizations from HIPAA oral speech privacy litigation or penalties, compliance with these LEED acoustic standards could serve to bolster arguments that reasonable steps had been taken to guard speech privacy in health care settings. Alternatively, in the event of HIPAA oral speech privacy damage claims or penalties, failure to meet the acoustic standards of EQ Credit 9.2 in an otherwise LEED-certified health care facility may be seen as failing to adequately address oral speech privacy issues.

Our independent acoustical consultants work closely with health care architects and facilities managers to design proper acoustical environments to satisfy the acoustic requirements of health care LEED certification credits, improve patient satisfaction, and protect patient privacy.

While much of our acoustical consulting firm’s clients are in the Midwest, our highly experienced consultants are experts in health care acoustics and serve health care clients on a national basis with respect to LEED certification requirements and HIPAA oral speech privacy concerns.

Our acoustical consulting firm does not represent any product manufacturers, suppliers, or other service providers. Accordingly, our clients can be assured our acoustical consultants’ recommendations are unbiased, free from any conflicts of interest, and focused only on development of the most appropriate design solutions.

Acoustics By Design's LEED certification-related services for health care acoustics include:

• Acoustical design for patient room noise levels
• Design solutions for minimizing the impact of site exterior noise on building occupants and the surrounding community
• Design and specification of acoustical finishes and details in health care environments
• Acoustical design of nurse and charting stations and other open staff areas
• Acoustic design for sound isolation related to HIPAA patient privacy compliance
• HIPAA oral speech privacy acoustical audits
• Design and specification of appropriate sound masking systems for speech privacy and patient satisfaction
• Proper design of paging and call systems in health care facilities
• Proper audibility of clinical and other tonal alarms in health care environments
• Sound and noise isolation of conference rooms, auditoria, and other meeting settings in mixed-use environments
• Noise and vibration isolation of mechanical systems, power generation, medical technology, road and rail traffic, and footfall
• Noise isolation of and from heliport and other emergency transport areas
• Acoustical measurement and monitoring of interior and exterior noise and vibration.
• Design of audio-visual and sound systems for auditoria, meeting, and training environments