[JLM]

Moderator please move to a more appropriate place if you want.

I just received a small brochure from the Starkey Hearing Foundation, a charitable organization (IRS 501(c)3 qualified non-profit) that has donated over 200,000 hearing aids to the needy around the world.  From the brochure:

•   10% of all Americans have hearing impairment
•   There are more 45 – 64 year old Americans with hearing loss than those over 65
•   60% of all those with hearing impairment are male
•   More than 1/3 of hearing loss can be attributed to loud work, recreational activities, or music
•   Hearing loss is starting earlier than ever before
•   Only 10% of hearing impairments can be treated surgically; 90% is irreversible
•   Hearing impairment includes not just hearing loss but can result in permanent pain (tinnitus), refer to this link - http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/tinnitus/DS00365
•   Hearing loss affects primarily higher frequencies

Damage to your hearing can start at:

•   115 dB for 15 minutes
•   110 dB for 30 minutes
•   105 dB for 1 hour
•   100 dB for 2 hours
•    95 dB for 4 hours
•    90 dB for 8 hours

As many of us fit the American male baby boomer demographic, and perhaps listen louder/longer than we should I wanted to bring this to everyone’s attention.  Note that users of firearms, headphones, and earbuds are at greater risk.  As audiophiles we especially should get our hearing tested annually.

I have no affiliation with the Starkey Hearing Foundation.

They can be contacted at:

866-354-3254
www.sotheworldmayhear.org
1245 S. Main Street, Suite 200, Grapevine TX  76051

[lonewolfny42]

Moderator please move to a more appropriate place if you want.

What ?.....wait a minute...can't hear you....let me lower this down....

Good topic JLM....I did happen to read rajacat's post about the time length till damage...

Thanks for posting.......

[lonewolfny42]

Hearing loss is starting earlier than ever before...

Can you say...."iPod"....

[Wind Chaser]

•   10% of all Americans have hearing impairment

10% that's all?  I would have thought that figure to be much higher.  Guess it depends on how one defines "impairment".

Impairment strikes me as an odd word to describe hearing loss.  AFAIK my ears are always sober, they don't drink unless I'm in the shower or swimming.  Perhaps "compromised" as in reduced sensitivity and limited range (I don't hear anything after 12K) is a more accurate term?

John

[satfrat]

 I myself rarely get over 90db and am around 75-80db most of the time. But it wasn't always this way. I use to blow speakes on a regular basis thru out my 20's. It's the young that need to heed this warning. at 56, I've already had noticable high tone hearing loss in 1 ear. Considering that I couldn't be around those high frequency alarm systems like the one at the Smithsonian that watches over the Hope diamond because the piercing sound have me head aches. This was back when I was 18 and my hearing wass intensely keen then. Now 38 years later, the damage from factory work, lawn mowing, rock concerts, my audio systems (especially the ones in my cars) have all contributed. For the last 2 years, I had been wearing specially custom made ear protection at work but too little too late for me. Before I started with the ear plugs, I was coming home and listening to my system at a moderately high volume. It wasn't til a saturday when I'd start listening to my system where it had been set the night before and find that the volume was blasting loud. Being thick as a brick, it took me a while for figure it out that the reason the volume was so high was because of 8 hours in that shop w/o hearing protection so when I came home, the volume had to be high just for me to enjoy. It wasn't til having some quiet time for my ears to recover before I realized how load I was playing my system after work. Had I been more conscience of these things when i was young, I'd be getting more out of my system than i presently am. The brain is a funny thing so because I still hear high frequencys in 1 ear, I don't realize I have a problem til I do the "cover 1 ear" trick. It's then that I realize the extent of the damage.

More and more nowadays, you see folks mowing their lawns with muffs or other hearing protection. Foks are much more aware of things like this today than they were back in my day. And that's a good thing!.  

Robin

[richidoo]

I wonder if the hearing damage times are continuous or peak?  Do I have a total of 8 hours to finish all the lawnmowing I need to do in a lifetime, or will it heal back by next week? Only half kidding, it would be cool to know more technical details about this to apply to daily life.

Using in ear headphones (sealing buds) or even better yet custom molded earphones is much safer than those white earbuds that come with iPod/Walkman. Sealing out the background noise allows you to hear the music clearly at a lower level than unsealed which lets in background noise. Listening to iPod stock phones while mowing the lawn can be dangerous if you wanna "rock out" cuz you gotta drown out the mower.

I played in jazz bands for a long time, with loud cymbals close to my head on small stage. I emerged mostly unscathed. But I pissed off a few drummers by telling them to play softer. A rimshot can be very painful!
Rich

[JohnR]

I think that's a daily amount for continuous level.

Motorcyclists should wear plugs too, noise levels inside a helmet at freeway speeds are 110-120 dB (as I recall, I read an article years ago where a British mag measured it)

[John Casler]

That reminds me that I seldom drive my car at high speed with the driverside window down.

While it isn't noisy, the amount of pressure variations to the tympanic membrane are substantial and large.

[SET Man]

Hey!

  This come to no surprise for me. People today are not taken this seriously.

   lonewolfny42 is right about the iPod and other portable stuffs. This will be a much more wide spread problem in the future with my generation are now blasting their ears with music with the headphone.

   Believe it or not I do now regretted that I didn't take good care of my ears when I was younger. Yup, I was listening to Walkman... remembered those?... on my way and back from school daily.

   But of course it is not too late. I am now very aware of this and protect my ears whenever I can. Instead of using headphone on the noisy NYC's Subway I wear foam earplugs. Although it is harder to do so at work sometime but this is better than nothing.

   And yes I rarely listen to my system louder than 90dB peak. Most of the time it would be about 85dB peak. I rather listen at these level for the rest of my life than listen to a much louder level now and can't hear anything later.

   Better to be safe than sorry. You won't notice this right away. It is accumulative over time by the time you notice it than it is too late.

Take care,
Buddy

PS

Don't get me started with those loud Harley type motorcycles. Those are noise polluters. It is suck walking around of what already a noisy city here in NYC than you have a guy showing of his noise polluters by blasting it! I want to scream at them "Noise polluter!" But I guess they can't hear me anyway   If you own this type of bike please respect other's people in the city area.

[JLM]

I believe that time/dB figures are per session.  Loss/impairment typically comes in lots of tiny chunks.

After half a season mowing with a rider at the new "estate" versus the in town patch of lawn, I started wearing protection.  Now that reads funny doesn't it?     No wonder the neighbors all stare.     But before I'd walk away from 1.5 hours of mowing everything sounded dull and muted (temporary loss).

Whenever I show off the man cave (dedicated listening room) and describe the insulation features I always get the "so you can turn it up" comments.  But I explain that isolating sound works two ways and the most important way is to keep noise out so I don't need to "crank it up".

Impairment is not the same as loss.  Impairment is a more inclusive term that can include temporary loss, tinnitus, or worse.

BTW Trisha Yearwood is their spokesperson.  I wonder how loud her concerts are.

[nathanm]

I dunno how people can wear headphones in public and feel comfortable, I always feel cut off and paranoid. 

[saisunil]

Thanks for the reminder JLM

I use foamies with my IEMs when riding a subway and I can enjoy music while in transit at low to medium volumes because of isolation.
As a matter of fact the moment I removes the IEMs, my ears immediately sense an increased level of noise / sound from the outside world - be it subway station or street level.

Cheers
Sunil.

[budyog]

ENT's say that we all start losing are upper frequency hearing naturally starting in our late 30s and it just gets worse as we get older!    And there is nothing that can be done about it yet except for aids. That is probably why we see some people adding super tweeters or wanting more highs with their systems. And then on top of that, add in all the extreme uncontrollable noise and controllable noise occurring around us everyday.
I use to build hot rods and I loved my 327 Chevy without mufflers! The beautiful sound of that engine without mufflers and the Hedman headers were music to my ears and then the smoke from those tires!    And of course, the Walkmans, (I had one too) power tools, guns, mowers, concerts, hi-fi and the list goes on. 
We are not the only ones!

http://www.hearinglossweb.com/Medical/Causes/nihl/mus/mus.htm#daltrey

[Martyn]

The exposure limits are intended as guidelines for noisy work environments. In recent years, the 8 hour exposure level has been reduced to 85 dB in many jurisdictions. Having learned my lesson the hard way (permanent, annoying tinitis), I now wear ear-defenders as a matter of course with almost any power equipment, and even when hammering nails (especially indoors). Skilsaws are particularly nasty.

It's correct that your hearing rolls off from the upper frequencies as you grow older (I'm down to 15 kHz now), but hearing damage due to excessive exposure is rather different. In this case, your hearing resonse shows a dip instead of a roll-off - around 4 - 6 kHz if my memory serves. Thus it is quite easy for an audiologist to determine whether hearing loss is due to age or damage. Given the choice, I'd prefer to suffer the roll-off. This is just as well, because there's nothing I can do about the aging process, but I can limit my exposure to loud noise.

[JLM]

Interesting point budyog (aging audiophiles buying supertweeters).  I wonder if anyone has ever tracked purchase of supertweeters to age of the purchaser.  OTOH as high frequency hearing loss due to aging comes so gradually that many would acclaimate to it (so the interest/advange of a supertweeter would reduced).

[Mike Dzurko]

Good point on the supertweeters.  And the upper range hearing loses that occur because of damage I'm sure is one of the reasons that some people prefer speakers that have a rising high -end or brighter than neutral response.  I've been careful and lucky . . .

[stereocilia]

As far as exposure limits go, there is a great deal of variability.  Two people with exactly the same exposure may get two different amounts of hearing loss.  To be even more conservative than the OSHA exposure limits, I remember reading long ago that a 3 dB increase per halving of the exposure time was considered instead of the current 5 dB steps starting at 85 for 8 hours.

[stereocilia]

I meant to add that adding a supertweeter or cranking up the highs when you have HFSNHL (high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss) isn't exactly a solution.  EQ might make the highs audible but they will still be really loud which most people, including people with hearing loss, don't like.  It's better to think of hearing loss as an increase in noise floor and distortion of the ear rather than a simple volume attenuation.

Don't be depressed, though, I'm fairly sure that some high-frequency loss does not destroy the ability to hear subtle differences between hi-fi components.

[Levi]

Talking about thread revival here.  I just happened to be reading a book that talks about primary aging among adults.  Hearing loss is a natural decline as our bodies grow older.  It is somewhat gradual and imperceptible up to a certain age. 

What the book states is that even if you are not exposed to noise pollution, aging will eventually take toll on our bodies.  Hearing loss starts at the age after 20.  However it is not noticeable until the age of 65+.  Everyone's genetic makeup is different from one another...some reach it sooner and some at a later stage.  Accept it or not sensorineural hearing loss is upon us.  With the decline of loud-soft discrimination, it is difficult to hear sound staging for some adults.  Please don't ask you wife who is the same old as you.  I ask your son/daughter/friend who is in his/her early teens.  Train them to listen.  LOL!

Whether this is debatable or not we cannot escape mother nature.  Everyone ages and eventually become history.  My point is enjoy what you have now while you we still can.