Healing Patient Rooms

Rationale:

Many study reports described benefits of natural sunlight. It is believed that artificial light can achieve similar benefits as sunlight and can be used to compensate for the lack of sunlight, for instance in north-facing hospital rooms or during wintertime.

The most plausible paths mediating the effects of light are:

* the biological effect of light, relating to circadian biology and the sleep/wake-rhythm; * the emotional/psychological effects of light, relating to mood/stress and the antidepressant action of light .

Objective:

The project aims to measure, evaluate and quantify the beneficial effects of a dynamic daylight & atmosphere experience in patient rooms for cardiovascular patients during the dark months of the year.

Study design:

The study involves an experiment in which psychological, emotional and clinical parameters of patients in hospital rooms with standard light situation are compared with those of patients in rooms with a dynamic daylight & atmosphere experience.

Study population:

The population includes cardiovascular patients who reside in the general cardiology department of the Maastricht University Hospital (18 patient beds) with an intended minimum length of stay of 3 days, who have given written consent.

Intervention:

Half of the patient rooms on the ward are equipped with special luminaires. In the ceiling, luminaires are installed that offer the basic lighting in the patient room that will automatically and gradually change in light level (100-300 lux) and color temperature (3000-4000 K). This so called daily rhythm light meets the EN12464-1 standard for patient rooms in hospitals. The same luminaires in the ceiling will also offer the light boost by bringing the illuminance to a level of maximal 2000 lux and 7000 K, during a period of two hours in the morning. Besides the ceiling luminaires, a low intensity color cove as well as some white LED spots are added to create a pleasant ambience in the patient room

Main study parameters/endpoints:

The primary study measures are length of stay and quality of recovery expressed by physiological, emotional and clinical parameters. Also the effect on patient satisfaction is determined using pre and post assessments.