Noise. Has your hospital found a solution?

[eriksoln, BSN, RN]

Almost every hospital I've worked at has a noise issue. I'm sure yours does too. If not so much, how did they get to that point?

Is it a major issue in your PG scores?

What do you do to lower it (other than the obvious "Dont yell near the pt. rooms" even though some dont even get this)?

I was just wondering. The other night, I recalled a very nice pt. who called me into her room and......she was not being silly, it was a serious question.......asked if we were doing construction. I was, oh, about 2 or 3 am. Thats a problem.

[StrwbryblndRN]

Something as simple as putting the ac/heat on even just to blow air helps keep the noise down for the pt. Not all hospitals have this option but if a pt is sensitive I use this as my first line of defense. Otherwise we try to keep it down. Being overnight helps since we only have a couple of people to hush if necessary.

[eriksoln, BSN, RN]

Its a tough thing to deal with. Everyone who makes hosp. equip. makes them to beed this way and that way. Yeah right, rest.......no one gets rest in the hospital.

[hypocaffeinemia, BSN, RN]

My hospital's solution, for better or worse: http://hypocaffeinemia.com/2009/01/inside-voices-please/

[eriksoln, BSN, RN]

OMG, my unit (UPMC) tried these. Management got tired of people making fun of them for getting the "yakker tracker" and quit using them.

Seriously. How do you expect, a machine that beeps loudly, to reduce the noise on your unit. It makes not sense whatsoever.

[prinsessa]

Where I work the nurses and tech carry phones so that they don't need to be called over the loud speaker. It doesn't always work though since people don't always use the phones.

[koala_bear]

we have a yakker tracker on our unit too. it was set so low what it would start alarming whenever we had to put or take something from the charts and had to clip the ring binders together. the "snap!" of those binders made the alarm go off and the alarm made more noise than the binders themselves. it was so stupid that people started messing with the settings and got our manager all upset. now, it's on mute. the lights still flash depending on the noise level. visitors and patients get a kick out of seeing the lghts change... "it's red....do i have to stop walking or something?"

carrying phones help a lot i think. no need to yell to the other nurse at the end of the hall. course in my case, the phone almost always rings when i'm trying to sneak into a room usually at midnight to do my rounds which of course wakes up my patient

[swirlygirl]

Yeah, our hospital found a solution to reduce noise. Cutting staff. Less staff=less noise. (sarcasm! lol)