Assessment of Hearing Loss among Workers of A Sugarcane Industry

Abstract

Background: Occupational noise exposure is likely to contribute in very high proportion of cases of sensorineural hearing loss in workers who are continuously exposed to high frequency noise being emitted from industrial machines Objectives: 1-To estimate the proportion of noise induced hearing loss among study participants. 2-To study the different types of hearing loss among study participants.3-To study non-audiological health problems related to noise exposure among the study participants. Results: A total of 120 were included in the study i.e 60 in the case group and 60 in the control group. The age of study population ranged from 26-55 years with mean age of 47.1 years in the study group. The range of SPL meter reading was between 85 to 96 dB in the working environment of study population. 30 % of study population had hearing defects,as compared to 8.33% of comparison group. Majority(65%) i.e 13 participants had sensorineural hearing loss and the rest 7 had conductive hearing loss.Majority had bilateral hearing loss.Hypertension, headache and sleep disturbances were reported high among the study participants. Conclusion: A regular medical examination,use of personal protective equipment and periodical maintainence of machines will be useful for protection of the workers from excessive noise prevailing at the work place environment.