Children's Hospital Boston LED Lighting

For over a century, Children's Hospital Boston has been dedicated to providing excellence in patient care while remaining sensitive to the complex and diverse needs of children and their families. That dedication is evident in the newly opened HSCT unit (Hematopoeitic Stem Cell Transplant unit) at the hospital's Boston location. Children undergoing stem cell transplants for cancer treatment require special care for their sensitive immune systems. This new unit takes into account the special care needs of these patients, while also offering some "extras" to make their stay -- which can average 60 to 70 days - as comfortable as possible. One of those extras is intelligent LED lighting from Color Kinetics, which can be found in a number of ceiling tiles throughout the patient rooms. With this technology, patients now have control over the atmosphere of their room, changing the colors and effects to suit their mood or the time of day.

Ceiling tiles illuminated with Color Kinetics® iColor® Cove fixtures can be found in all 13 rooms in the unit. Boston-based Cannon Design created custom housings measuring approximately 2' x 2', each lined with eight pieces of iColor Cove® 12" fixtures. The housings are covered with a frosted panel (which may easily slide out to assist with any maintenance needs) creating uniformly colored tiles spaced randomly throughout the room. Cannon then designed custom light shows using Color Kinetics ColorPlay® light show authoring software, and stored them on individual iPlayer® 2 devices in each room. The custom shows are easily controlled and instantaneously transitioned using Color Kinetics Controller Keypad, allowing patients to choose shows depending on their mood, whether they want fun and playful or soothing and relaxing.In another high-tech twist, the rooms also contain computer stations allowing patients to synchronize the ceiling tiles to their music CDs via ckAmp, Color Kinetics' free downloadable plug-in for the popular Winamp media player. Eventually, the hospital hopes to provide a copy of ColorPlay software in each room so patients may custom-design their own light shows! The result: Rooms that keep its young patients engaged and interested during their stays, enhancing the healthy atmosphere of this world-class hospital.