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The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan
INTRODUCTION: Stoneworkers in Taiwan are exposed to occupational noise and suffer hearing impairment. A complete assessment of exposure and health effects is needed for a better understanding. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We accessed nine stone factories, monitored the environmental and personal doses of...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Medknow Publications & Media Pvt Ltd
2018
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6122265/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30136674 http://dx.doi.org/10.4103/nah.NAH_45_17 |
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author | Huang, Feng-Jung Hsieh, Chia-Jung Young, Chi H. Chung, Shun-Hui Tseng, Chun-Chieh Yiin, Lih-Ming |
author_facet | Huang, Feng-Jung Hsieh, Chia-Jung Young, Chi H. Chung, Shun-Hui Tseng, Chun-Chieh Yiin, Lih-Ming |
author_sort | Huang, Feng-Jung |
collection | PubMed |
description | INTRODUCTION: Stoneworkers in Taiwan are exposed to occupational noise and suffer hearing impairment. A complete assessment of exposure and health effects is needed for a better understanding. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We accessed nine stone factories, monitored the environmental and personal doses of noise, analyzed the frequency spectra of noise from various machines, and recruited 55 stoneworkers and 25 administrative staff as controls for pure tone audiometry testing. RESULTS: The means (standard deviations) of 8-h time-weighted averages for environmental and personal monitoring were 85.0 (6.2) and 87.0 (5.5) dB(A), respectively, with seven of nine personal measurements being higher than the respective environmental results. The monitoring data suggest that occupational noise in the stonework environments should be a matter of great concern. Nearly all frequency spectra indicated peak values occurring between 2 and 4 kHz, which were within the bands for early noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL). The mean hearing threshold levels of the study participants were elevated in low and high frequencies (29.2 and 41.2 dB) compared to that of controls (∼25 dB for both bands). Linear regression analysis indicated no significance in the low frequencies (P = 0.207) but statistical significance in the high frequencies (P = 0.002) after adjustment for covariates, suggesting NIHL among the stoneworkers. CONCLUSION: Stoneworkers apparently display early signs of NIHL. Noises in the stonework factories with peaks in the high frequencies are harmful to hearing ability. Employers and workers have to comply with the regulation strictly to prevent further hearing damage. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-6122265 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2018 |
publisher | Medknow Publications & Media Pvt Ltd |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-61222652018-09-12 The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan Huang, Feng-Jung Hsieh, Chia-Jung Young, Chi H. Chung, Shun-Hui Tseng, Chun-Chieh Yiin, Lih-Ming Noise Health Original Article INTRODUCTION: Stoneworkers in Taiwan are exposed to occupational noise and suffer hearing impairment. A complete assessment of exposure and health effects is needed for a better understanding. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We accessed nine stone factories, monitored the environmental and personal doses of noise, analyzed the frequency spectra of noise from various machines, and recruited 55 stoneworkers and 25 administrative staff as controls for pure tone audiometry testing. RESULTS: The means (standard deviations) of 8-h time-weighted averages for environmental and personal monitoring were 85.0 (6.2) and 87.0 (5.5) dB(A), respectively, with seven of nine personal measurements being higher than the respective environmental results. The monitoring data suggest that occupational noise in the stonework environments should be a matter of great concern. Nearly all frequency spectra indicated peak values occurring between 2 and 4 kHz, which were within the bands for early noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL). The mean hearing threshold levels of the study participants were elevated in low and high frequencies (29.2 and 41.2 dB) compared to that of controls (∼25 dB for both bands). Linear regression analysis indicated no significance in the low frequencies (P = 0.207) but statistical significance in the high frequencies (P = 0.002) after adjustment for covariates, suggesting NIHL among the stoneworkers. CONCLUSION: Stoneworkers apparently display early signs of NIHL. Noises in the stonework factories with peaks in the high frequencies are harmful to hearing ability. Employers and workers have to comply with the regulation strictly to prevent further hearing damage. Medknow Publications & Media Pvt Ltd 2018 /pmc/articles/PMC6122265/ /pubmed/30136674 http://dx.doi.org/10.4103/nah.NAH_45_17 Text en Copyright: © 2018 Noise & Health http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0 This is an open access journal, and articles are distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 License, which allows others to remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially, as long as appropriate credit is given and the new creations are licensed under the identical terms. |
spellingShingle | Original Article Huang, Feng-Jung Hsieh, Chia-Jung Young, Chi H. Chung, Shun-Hui Tseng, Chun-Chieh Yiin, Lih-Ming The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan |
title | The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan |
title_full | The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan |
title_fullStr | The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan |
title_full_unstemmed | The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan |
title_short | The Assessment of Exposure to Occupational Noise and Hearing Loss for Stoneworkers in Taiwan |
title_sort | assessment of exposure to occupational noise and hearing loss for stoneworkers in taiwan |
topic | Original Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6122265/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30136674 http://dx.doi.org/10.4103/nah.NAH_45_17 |
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