Acoustics and soundproofing for hospitals in Muscat

01 / What actually goes wrong

Three problems, running at the same time in the same building

A hospital acoustic strategy is sound isolation where conversations and equipment are, and absorption where people wait, work and recover. Treating everything to one target wastes budget in some rooms and under-delivers in the ones that matter.

• The consultation is audible in the corridor

  Most consulting room partitions are lightweight, stop at the ceiling grid and carry a door with a gap under it, so speech reaches the waiting area over the wall and around the leaf. Patients notice: if they can hear the consultation before theirs, they assume theirs will be heard too. Ward bays are the same problem with a curtain instead of a wall, where the only thing that helps is enough absorption that nobody has to raise their voice.

• Patients are not sleeping, and recovery depends on it

  Alarms, trolleys, door closers, staff handovers at night and a corridor of hard surfaces that keeps every one of those sounds alive for longer than it should. Wards and recovery areas are built in materials chosen for infection control, all of which are hard, so the room has almost no absorption and every event is heard the length of it.

• Plant and diagnostic equipment arrive through the structure

  Chillers, air handling units, pumps, medical gas plant and the diagnostic suite are bolted to the slab, so the low frequency energy travels through the building rather than through the air and appears in rooms nowhere near them. An MRI suite adds its own problem: the scanner is loud and low in frequency, and the acoustic and shielding design for the scanner room itself belongs to the scanner supplier and the project consultant, not to a panel.

03 / Zone by zone

Eight zones, set by function before anything else

A hospital runs quiet and noisy functions next to each other all day and all night. Zones are defined by what each space is for, then treated to their own target, which is also how the budget stops being spread evenly over rooms that do not need it.

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  Consulting and counselling rooms

  The rooms where privacy is a clinical requirement rather than a comfort one. Mass in the partition, the ceiling void closed above it and a sealed door do the work; absorption inside stops the room being so live that people raise their voices in the first place. Counselling rooms need the same build and a softer finish.

  • SoundBlanket® 4 mm, STC 34, in the partition and over the partition head
  • BassBloc® 20 mm, NRC 0.85, in the cavity
  • Perimeter and bottom door seals, silicone and EPDM, 6 x 6 mm D-profile
  • PET felt panels above the dado line

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  Patient rooms and wards

  Rest is the outcome being bought here. Every surface in a ward is specified for cleaning, so the room starts with almost no absorption and a dropped instrument tray is heard the length of it. The ceiling is the only large surface available, and a single wall panel above bed head height is usually all the wall space that can be given up.

  • Felt ceiling tiles, 600 x 600 and 1200 x 600 mm, 9 to 24 mm, NRC 0.30 to 0.60
  • Metal ceiling tiles, GI, aluminium or stainless, up to NRC 1.0 with fleece backing
  • PET felt panels, 40 plus colours, above hand height
  • Acoustic curtains, NRC up to 0.70, 5 mm, 500 GSM, at windows

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  ICU and recovery

  The highest concentration of alarms and equipment in the hospital, and the patients least able to tolerate it. Wall space is taken by services and headwalls, so absorption goes overhead. Anything fitted here has to sit within the cleaning and infection control regime for the unit, which is what rules out most conventional absorbers.

  • Felt baffles and clouds, 9 / 12 / 18 / 24 mm, custom sizes
  • Metal ceiling tiles where the ceiling is washed down
  • Fibreglass ceiling tiles, 100 kg/m³, 15 and 20 mm, Class A to EN 13501-1
  • PET felt panels on the available wall area

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  Corridors and nurse stations

  Long hard runs that connect every ward door and carry trolleys, conversation and door closers at all hours. Corridors are also where staff coordinate, so the target is a short decay rather than silence: clear instructions at the station, and none of it still ringing outside the ward doors.

  • Felt baffles along the ceiling run, EchoCore 15, EchoPro 18 and EchoMax 22
  • Metal ceiling tiles in a grid where cleaning demands it
  • PET felt panels above the crash rail and the trolley bumper line
  • Door seals and drop-down bottom seals on ward doors

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  Reception and waiting areas

  A hard, usually double height volume full of people who are anxious already, plus a public address system and a queue at a counter. Voices build up, the announcement becomes unintelligible and everyone speaks louder. Ceiling absorption does most of the work; a wooden face keeps the finish appropriate for a public entrance.

  • Ceiling clouds and baffles in the volume
  • Wooden slats, NRC 0.75, EN 13501-1 Class B s1 d0
  • Perforated panels, NRC 0.70, on the feature walls
  • Acoustic screens, NRC 0.30 at 9 mm, 1800 x 900 mm, at reception counters

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  Operation theatres

  The internal finishes belong to the theatre specification and infection control, so our scope is the construction around the room: keeping the plant, the corridor and the adjacent suite out of it, and keeping what is said in it from travelling. The barrier goes into the surrounding partitions and above the ceiling, not on the theatre face.

  • SoundBlanket® 4 mm, STC 34, in the surrounding partitions and above the ceiling
  • BassBloc® 20 to 40 mm in the cavity and around theatre plant
  • Anti-vibration mounts and pads under air handling serving the suite
  • EPDM perimeter seals on doors in the surrounding corridor walls

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  Diagnostics, MRI and plant rooms

  The loudest rooms in the hospital and often the closest to the quietest. Break the structural path under the machine first, because a chiller or a compressor bolted to the slab sends energy through the frame whatever the enclosure is lined with. For an MRI suite, the scanner room itself is designed by the scanner supplier and the project consultant; what we supply is the barrier and absorption in the surrounding construction and the plant space.

  • Anti-vibration mounts and pads under chillers, pumps and compressors
  • Sound insulation pads under equipment bases
  • SoundBlanket® lining the enclosure and lagging duct runs
  • Galaxy foam, NRC 0.95 at 50 mm to ASTM C423, inside a plant enclosure
  • Fibreglass ceiling tiles, 100 kg/m³, Class A to EN 13501-1

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  Ceilings, where most hospital absorption belongs

  Wall area in a hospital is taken up by headwalls, services, rails, gas outlets and cleaning. The ceiling is the one large surface that is out of reach, which is why baffles, clouds and acoustic tiles carry most of the absorption in a healthcare project and why a ceiling decision usually settles the BOQ. Baffles suit exposed services and high volumes; tiles suit a grid; clouds suit a specific area such as a nurse station or a waiting bay.

  • Felt baffles, NRC 0.30 at 9 mm, 9 / 12 / 18 / 24 mm, custom sizes
  • Felt clouds, EchoCore 15 at 1500 GSM, EchoPro 18 at 1800, EchoMax 22 at 2200
  • Felt ceiling tiles, NRC 0.30 to 0.60, in 600 x 600 and 1200 x 600 mm
  • Metal ceiling tiles, up to NRC 1.0 with fleece backing, for wipe-down areas

07 / Healthcare supply

Hospital groups we have supplied

MMTPL manufactures at its Palwal plant in Haryana and supplies hospital groups, fit-out contractors and acoustic consultants in India and the Middle East, across OPD and public zones, wards, consulting rooms, corridors and diagnostic areas.

Project level detail and scope of supply are on the projects page.