Photo credit: Батяшев Александр licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0
by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalitionhttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en
I’ve only read the press release and the abstract for this paper in JNeurosci but the findings are interesting. In chinchillas–a common animal model for hearing research–scientists at the University of Rochester and Purdue University found that mild noise-induced hearing loss also caused changes in nerve processing of auditory signals.
This may have implications for humans in terms of the very common “speech in noise” problem, in which people with normal audiograms complain that they can’t understand a conversation if the ambient noise level is moderate to high.
But to me, the most important implication of this study is that it emphasizes how important it is to protect our ears.
The only evidence-based noise exposure level to prevent hearing loss is a time-weighted average of 70 decibels a day and even that low level of noise exposure may be too high.
According to the World Health Organization, only one hour at 85 A-weighted decibels is enough to cause hearing loss.
The CDC states that noise-Induced hearing loss is entirely preventable. Avoid exposure to loud noise, or wear hearing protection if one can’t.
Because if something sounds too loud, it IS too loud.
