Lighting of a cardiac intensive care unit: Emotional and visual effects on patients and nurses

Abstract

This study discusses the emotional and visual effects of the luminous environment of cardiac intensive care units on both patients and nurses. We draw the following conclusions: (1) the light level, colour temperature, and lighting design all affect the satisfaction of both patients and nurses. (2) Although patients prefer a low colour temperature, nurses prefer a high colour temperature. The influence of colour temperature on the satisfaction of patients and nurses is smaller than factors such as light level and light distribution. (3) Major factors affecting patient satisfaction consist of an emotional factor and a visual factor in inverse correlation under several particular influences. (4) Nurse satisfaction approximates the visual factor score. (5) The visual factor scores of the subjects (patients and nurses) are in apparent positive correlation with light level. (6) In a scenario characterized by an illuminance of 200 lx, the trends in patients’ emotional factor and visual factor intersect where the emotional factor peaks. However, when the illuminance and average luminance grow further, the emotional factor score decreases.