The new LEED for Healthcare system allows up to two points for acoustics under the IEQ Credit 2 Acoustic Environment. Its intent is to “provide building occupants with an indoor healing environment free of intrusive or disruptive levels of sound.” Points can be earned by meeting requirements for increased sound isolation between rooms, reduced room noise levels, controlled reverberation time (acoustical finishes), and reduced site exterior noise.
At Acoustics By Design, we recently worked on a project that addressed these same issues during the design, even before LEED for Healthcare and the points for IEQ Credit 2 Acoustic Environment came online. That project was Henry Ford West Bloomfield Hospital near Detroit, Michigan. The project has recently been LEED Certified. Please take a moment to watch this video, and see what they did to optimize the healthcare environment for sound.
At ABD, our LEED AP Acoustical Engineers helped create these new acoustical guidelines by serving on the committee that wrote the source documents for them (Sound and Vibration and the FGI Guidelines) so they are experts at understanding and complying with the requirements. If you need a LEED AP acoustical consultant to help guide you through the process of hospital acoustic design, give us a call. We are proud to be leaders in the field of healthcare acoustics.
