Nielsen and her team investigated the sorts of art preferred by hospital patients. They determined that patients “primarily ranked items to favor figurative art painted in light colors.”
Stine Nielsen, Michael Mullins, Lars Fich, and Kirsten Roessler. 2017. “The Significance of Certain Elements in Art for Patients’ Experience and Use.” Visual Anthropology, vol. 30, no. 4, pp. 310-327.
A research team lead by Huckels-Baumgart found that separate medication rooms in hospitals are a good investment. They report that “Interruptions and errors during the medication process are common. . . .
The last place can be a good place
Tanja-Dijkstra and her colleagues linked seeing coastal scenes via virtual reality and experiencing less pain (even during dental treatments such as tooth extractions and fillings). They report that “Virtual reality (VR) distraction has become increasingly available in health care contexts and is used in acute pain management. However, there has been no systematic exploration of the importance of the content of VR environments. Two studies tested how interacting with nature VR influenced experienced and recollected [remembered] pain after 1 week. . . .
A press release from Nagoya University indicates that seeing ourselves while we eat affects how much food we consume. The reported findings have repercussions for the use of mirrors and mirror-like surfaces in spaces where people will eat and are particularly relevant, for example, in environments for older individuals who often dine alone. Researchers determined that “people eating alone reported food as tasting better, and ate more of it, when they could see themselves reflected in a mirror, compared with when they ate in front of a monitor displaying an image of a wall.” Previous rese
Papalambros and her team have learned that hearing pink noise (described here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_noise) while sleeping can enhance sleep quality and memory performance the day after the pink noise is heard among older individuals. People 60 to 84 years old participated in the Papalambros lead study and the pink noise was coordinated with sleeping brain rhythms. Zhou, Liu, Li, Ma, Zhang, and Fang (2012) reported, more generally, that “steady pink noise has significant effect on reducing brain wave complexity and induc
Smell orange, feel less stress
Altmann and David Hambrick confirm that mental interruptions can impede performance. They report that “As steps of a procedure are performed more quickly, memory for past performance . . . become less accurate, increasing the rate of skipped or repeated steps after an interruption. We found this effect, with practice generally improving speed and accuracy, but impairing accuracy after interruptions. . . .
Bedrosian and Nelson studied how being exposed to light at night influences wellbeing and mood. They share that “Many systems are under circadian control, including sleep–wake behavior, hormone secretion, cellular function and gene expression. Circadian disruption by nighttime light perturbs those processes and is associated with increasing incidence of certain cancers, metabolic dysfunction and mood disorders. . . .
Seeing images of nature in the labor/delivery room improves the experience of giving birth. Aburas and her team report that “Incorporating design elements and strategies that calm and reduce negative emotions may create positive experiences for women in labor.” When images of nature were present during the labor and delivery period, scores were higher on “the Quality of Care From the Patient’s Perspective (QPP) subscale. In addition, there was an increase in the QPP scores associated with the increase in Nature TV watching time, QPP mean of watching time (less than 1 hour) group . . .
