The benefits that music brings in patients who are in therapeutic or recovery processes begin to be recognized by the medical community, but when installing a sound system in a hospital it is not being taken into account.
By Richard Santa S.
Although silence predominates in hospitals and buildings dedicated to health care, there are several sound systems that require these spaces and among them music begins to play an important role. The industry is currently looking for and offering solutions so that everyone is integrated.
One of the most important, according to Juan Tamayo, project director of Almacenes La Cita AV, is the evacuation audio because preserving human life is an objective of health centers.
"Each floor, operating room, room and common areas must have a speaker system that allows the correct performance of evacuation logistics. This system must be certified or at least its design guided under international evacuation standards such as the NFPA."
He added that this system can also be used as a system of calls by floor, level or area, because the audio systems are very flexible, so adding a microphone and linking a call area is very simple.
Such a system can be used for institutional messaging or nursing calls. Now the system scheduler can select the priority level of each call.
Juan Tamayo indicated that there are very few equipment producers that deliver a solution that says "made for hospitals", and those that have this seal are high cost.
But it is in these cases that the creativity and innovation of audiovisual designers is put to the test, which, through their own designs, have developed systems for health centers in which a large number of technologies converge creating spaces that meet safety standards and offer different alternatives.
What does the industry offer?
Having all your sound systems integrated offers great benefits for hospitals or health centers, such as the best use of resources, saving money that they would otherwise have to spend by duplicating wiring, ducts, speakers and many other devices, but even more importantly, the truth ability to make each of the solutions more appropriate.
This was stated by Juan Fernando Montoya, sales manager Of The Central & South America Communications Division of Bosch, who said that "In case of emergency, all the systems would work as one and not as islands where ambient music is not spoken with the evacuation, nor with the sound reinforcement in the auditorium and much less with the radios of the people who can provide greater speed, tranquility and information in the emergency and that they have radios in their possession."
But how much does the industry offer this type of solution? There are digital systems on the market with decentralized work possibilities (fiber optics) for emergencies, mass evacuations and that provide in turn services of institutional advertisements and musical ambience in an optimal way.
As well as matrix audio distribution systems for auditoriums and boardrooms that are integrated into video to create highly productive rooms.
Also Intercom IP systems that allow a better and more agile critical communication between security and emergency people with the general public and in the opposite direction as well.
Juan Fernando Montoya commented that there are IP radio dispatch systems that integrate the different technologies and brands as a great system, in addition to joining it to normal telephony, SIP telephony, Nextel and the general periphonic system of the hospital.
Music in rehabilitation
The two experts consulted by AVI LATINOAMÉRICA agree that although new benefits of music are increasingly discovered in the processes of therapy and recovery of patients, this is not a determining factor, nor considered on many occasions, when implementing a sound system for a hospital.
For Juan Tamayo, ambient music does not become a determining factor when designing an audio system. The audio system is already evaluated, it is how clear the messages are delivered. Before audio systems were a plus, now they are a necessity. They become the critical point of emergency and evacuation systems.
"Ambient music is being redirected to music directed at rehabilitating patients. A certain type of music listened to at a sound pressure level can improve patients' recovery rates, some cancer centers are implementing these theories and have had an increase in patients' recovery time."
For his part, Juan Fernando Montoya maintains that it has been proven that music generates relaxation and greater tranquility and this can make the moments before the operation and recovery better and of higher quality, but the designs have not thought about taking advantage of that resource.
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Advantages of AV integration in hospitals
- Greater possibilities of evacuating personnel in the event of an emergency, preserving human life must be paramount in any distributed audio design.
- Better delivery of information to visitors and staff of the health center, a good sound system must be clear, and with new technologies you can deliver any type of information without losing key points.
- Better possibilities to deliver information on time, with digital signage systems and interactive whiteboards, health personnel have a better flow of information, delivering it correctly and in real time.
- Improvement in the education of new professionals in the health area, by improving education systems each student has the possibility to learn more about procedures, diagnoses that will make him grow professionally.
- Save resources, if we link an audio and video system remotely the health center can have specialists anywhere in the world. There are already specialized places where they perform a medical assessment from the other side of the world.
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