Comprehensive Analysis System for Automated Respiratory Cycle Segmentation and Crackle Peak Detection.

Digital auscultation is a well-known method for assessing lung sounds, but remains a subjective process in typical practice, relying on the human interpretation. Several methods have been presented for detecting or analyzing crackles but are limited in their real-world application because few have been integrated into comprehensive systems or validated on non-ideal data. This work details a complete signal analysis methodology for analyzing crackles in challenging recordings.

Nearly 40 years of domination by electret microphones.

The Reflections series takes a look back on historical articles from The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America that have had a significant impact on the science and practice of acoustics.

A Model of Clinical Alarm Errors in Hospital.

Although there has been much attention paid recently to clinical alarms, research has primarily focused on particular aspects of the clinical alarm problem, such as how to reduce nuisance alarms. This paper takes a broad view of clinical alarms and develops a model of errors in alarm handling and how they affect patients directly. Based on reports in the literature, I estimate that alarms that should sound by current standards do not sound about 9% of the time.

Quieting Weinberg 5C: a case study in hospital noise control.

Weinberg 5C of Johns Hopkins Hospital is a very noisy hematological cancer unit in a relatively new building of a large medical campus. Because of the requirements for dealing with immuno-suppressed patients, options for introducing sound absorbing materials are limited. In this article, a case study of noise control in a hospital, the sound environment in the unit before treatment is described, the chosen noise control approach of adding custom-made sound absorbing panels is presented, and the impact of the noise control installation is discussed.

Noise in the adult emergency department of Johns Hopkins Hospital.

While hospitals are generally noisy environments, nowhere is the pandemonium greater than in an emergency department, where there is constant flow of patients, doctors, nurses, and moving equipment. In this noise study we collected 24 h measurements throughout the adult emergency department of Johns Hopkins Hospital, the top ranked hospital in the U.S.

Noise levels in Johns Hopkins Hospital.

This article presents the results of a noise survey at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, MD. Results include equivalent sound pressure levels (L(eq)) as a function of location, frequency, and time of day. At all locations and all times of day, the L(eq) indicate that a serious problem exists.