Background: Washington State has experienced a striking increase in workers' compensation claims for hearing loss.
Methods: This cross-sectional study examined noise exposures and hearing conservation practices in one industry with a high rate of hearing loss claims. We evaluated 10 representative foundries with personal noise dosimetry, management interviews, employee interviews, and existing audiometry.
Results: Noise levels routinely exceeded 85 dBA. All companies were out of compliance with hearing conservation regulations. Most employees with important findings on audiograms were not aware of their findings. There was a significant positive correlation between management-interview scores and worksite-average employee-interview scores (r = 0.70, P = 0.02).
Conclusions: Companies where more effort is put into hearing conservation program activities can achieve a greater positive impact on employee awareness. However, there were broad deficiencies even in the better programs in this sample, suggesting that workers in this industry probably face a continuing substantial risk of occupational hearing loss.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/ajim.10124 | DOI Listing |
Cureus
November 2024
Otolaryngology- Head and Neck Surgery, King Abdulaziz University Faculty of Medicine, Jeddah, SAU.
Objectives: Implantable bone conduction hearing devices offer excellent auditory rehabilitation. Transcutaneous devices, which use an implanted magnet, are gaining popularity due to higher skin complications associated with traditional percutaneous devices. The Cochlear Baha® Attract System (Cochlear Corporation, Sydney, Australia) is a transcutaneous device and is regarded as a passive transcutaneous implant.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSci Rep
December 2024
Business Administration Group, University of Aleppo, Aleppo, Syria.
Noise pollution is defined as any disturbing or unwanted sound that disrupts or harms human health or wildlife. Noise pollution can have profound effects on both human health and the environment. For humans, exposure to excessive noise levels has been linked to a range of health issues, including hearing damage, stress, and sleep disturbances.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCommun Biol
December 2024
Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chengdu, 610213, China.
Mammals suffer permanent hearing impairment from the loss of auditory hair cells due to their inability to regenerate. In contrast, lower vertebrates exhibit extraordinary capacity for hair cell regeneration and hearing restoration, but the mechanisms remain unclear. Here we characterize the single-cell atlas of Xenopus laevis inner ear and perform a comprehensive comparison with mouse model.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Speech Lang Hear Res
December 2024
Department of Communicative Disorders and Deaf Education, Utah State University, Logan.
Purpose: When using the spatiotemporal index (STI) to measure variability across repetitions of the same stimulus, researchers will typically screen and remove productions that contain errors or disfluencies. However, this screening process is highly subjective, reduces the amount of data available, and may generate samples that are less representative of true speech difficulties. In this study, we quantify the degree to which the STI is skewed by the inclusion of highly deviating productions and whether alternative calculations could better facilitate their inclusion.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFClin Genet
December 2024
Development, Ageing and Disease, UCL Institute of Ophthalmology, London, UK.
Microphthalmia, anophthalmia and coloboma (MAC) comprise a highly heterogeneous spectrum of congenital ocular malformations with an estimated incidence of 1 in 5000 to 1 in 30 000 live births. Although there is likely to be a genetic component in the majority of cases, many remain without a molecular diagnosis. Netrin-1 was previously identified as a mediator of optic fissure closure from transcriptome analyses of chick and zebrafish and was shown to cause ocular coloboma when knocked out in both mouse and zebrafish.
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