Case Study

Veterinarian Office Soundproofing & Acoustic Treatment

Posted on by Rachel
Veterinarian Office Soundproofing and Acoustic Treatment
06
May

Vet offices, doggie daycares, and puppy grooming services all have one problem in common. All of them need to find economical and effective ways to reduce noise created by pets and their owners. As any canine owner knows, dogs make a lot of noise. And, if you’ve ever been to a vet’s office or doggy daycare, you know how loud it can get when the dogs start barking.

Learn More: When to Use Sound Absorbing Panels

Why Acoustically Treat a Veterinarians Office?

Whether it’s barking at the other dogs, barking at other people, or barking at a gentle breeze, noises from veterinary establishments can be extremely troublesome for the vets, vet technicians, pet owners, and of course the dogs. Dog barks are often extremely loud and low frequency (especially larger dogs). 

veterinarian office soundproofing and acoustic treatment
The lobby of this veterinarian office was finished with hard floors, and drywall wall and ceilings. Once dogs started to bark, or pet owners held conversations, the echo in the room became too loud for anyone to comfortably converse. This can be bad, especially if the receptionist is trying to talk on the phone with patients or convey important information to per owners in person.

In this particular veterinarian office, the interior finishes were hard flooring and drywall walls & ceilings. Because of this, sound from barking dogs seemed even louder because it was reverberating off all of the hard surfaces, and creating bad echo. There was also exterior train noise leaking in that added to the noisy environment.

Veterinary Office Noise Reduction – Scope of Work

In order to reduce reverb time and noise within the vet clinic, our team fabricated and installed acoustic wall panels in the lobby to reduce echo for the customers, their pets, and the front desk staff. 

In the dog kennel area there were painted CMU walls and a tremendous amount of echo even with a low ceiling of existing ACT.  Our team upgraded each ceiling tile to 0.90 NRC Armstrong Optima tiles (upgraded from 0.50 NRC existing).  We also added evenly spaced wall panels along the CMU walls. 

Our install crew also added high NRC ceiling tiles onto the ceiling grid, to further dampen sound within the space.

veterinarian office soundproofing and acoustic treatment
Standard ACT only has an NRC of around 0.5, but higher NRC tiles such as Armstrong Optima are closer to 0.9. 2″ thick acoustic wall panels have an NRC of 1.05, so with the two product combined in the kennel area of this vet’s office, echo and reverb were significantly reduced.

Benefits of Acoustic Treatment & Soundproofing in Veterinary Offices

By combining acoustic wall panels with a the new ACT, Commercial Acoustics was able to significantly reduce reverb time in the veterinarian office. Whether trying to stop animal noise or other disruptive sounds, consider using acoustic wall panels and high NRC acoustic ceiling tile to reduce echo and reverberation.

Rachel