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Death by beep? Bad sound design costs lives

This article was first published on Brighter World. Read the original article.

Medical alarms have appeared on the Emergency Care Research Institute’s list of top medical hazards four times — twice in the number one spot. According to a recent FDA survey, bad sound design for medical devices accounted for 566 deaths over four years, mostly because the sounds can be so annoying that they get turned down so doctors and nurses can concentrate, leading to potentially deadly consequences.

In this TEDx McMaster talk from February 2021, Michael Schutz, an associate professor of music cognition and percussion, explains how his research with the Music Acoustics Perception Learning (MAPLE) lab is helping to create better alarms — and better patient outcomes.

Read the papers related to this research