Hospitals need acoustic flooring to manage noise levels from heavy footfall, trolleys and beds. Hard flooring is easy to keep clean but also notoriously poor at dampening sound, creating noisy corridors and rooms that impact patient comfort.

The right flooring can significantly reduce noise levels in hospitals and control vibration without compromising durability and sanitation.

The wrong hospital floor can raise noise levels, with shoes, wheelchairs, beds, trolleys and hospital equipment creating a wall of noise.

Here are your best options for acoustic flooring for hospitals:

Floating floors for hospitals 

Depending on the subfloor and desired acoustic qualities, a floating floor made from timber or concrete might be best. Timber floating floors isolate sounds and impacts from the building structure, providing ultimate sound dampening qualities.

The TVs Raised Adjustable Acoustic Floor System is an optimal solution for individual rooms and corridors, suitable for all subfloor types. It has galvanised steel battens with an acoustic dampener to absorb sounds and vibration.

Another high-performance option is the TVs RESi FF System, which supports lightweight floors and heavy raft foundations. It dramatically reduces impact and airborne sounds, transforming hospitals into quiet, relaxed spaces.

Acoustic underlays 

Hospital floors are normally finished in sheet vinyl, bio-based tile or polyurethane. The simplest way to improve acoustics with these systems is to install a soft elastic material under the floor finish. This will reduce noise from footsteps and falling objects, potentially reducing noise levels by 10 to 20 Decibels.

Additionally, the dampening qualities of an elastic underlay make hard floors great at absorbing shock, improving comfort for patients and staff – staff can spend more time on their feet before getting aches and pains.

The downside to acoustic underlays is they do not isolate impacts and vibration. For this, you need a floating floor.

Summing up 

Acoustic flooring improves the patient experience and helps staff stay on their feet for longer by absorbing impacts and shock.

Both acoustic underlays and floating floors can reduce noise levels in hospitals. For general traffic, underlay is enough, but for heavy footfall, you should consider floating floors so that sounds and vibrations don’t transmit to other spaces. You should also choose a floating floor if you need an acoustic floor installed over an existing floor.

We can recommend the right floating floor for your hospital – get in touch for a chat and no-obligation advice.