Noisiest Jobs in the World

Blog Layout

Noisiest Jobs in the World

Karl.B • Aug 17, 2019

Do you work in a noisy sector? Are you concerned about your hearing health, or worried that your employees might face hearing loss? Even the noisiest jobs in the world don’t need to cause hearing loss if you learn about the risks, and provide the best in hearing protection for all your staff. Here are a few of the noisiest jobs in the world, and the decibel levels you should be watching out for.

Noise Induced Hearing Loss

Millions of workers in America are exposed to dangerously loud sounds, and risk noise induced hearing loss (NIHL). They face sounds so loud that they can experience permanent hearing loss in one afternoon if they’re not wearing hearing protection. Usually, NIHL is a gradual process, from being exposed to loud sounds each and every day.

Understanding noise induced hearing loss is all about understanding decibel levels. Decibels (dB) are how we measure sound, and any sounds over 85 dB will damage your hearing. To put that into perspective, the volume of normal conversation is around 60 dB, your blender is anywhere from 80 – 90 dB, and your child’s classroom is around 85 dB.

Noisiest Jobs in the World

There are a few jobs that are notoriously loud, with very high decibel levels that can cause a lot of damage to your hearing health. Factories and farms are very noisy, with dB levels often exceeding 100 dB. At that volume, a day of work will cause damage to the delicate cells in the ear. If you have a manufacturing business, your employees need to protect their hearing. Musicians face dangerous sound levels of up to 110 dB. Construction workers also have loud jobs, with heavy machinery and power tools reaching sounds of around 120 dB. Finally, airport ground staff work in excessively loud environments, and if they’re not wearing hearing protection, risk severe hearing loss in just a few minutes, with sounds reaching 140 dB! If you’ve noticed their orange earmuffs, you can be sure those aren’t for show, but are absolutely necessary for their health and safety.

Other noisy jobs include bouncers and bar staff, who experience sounds of 115 dB for a few hours every night. Formula one drivers face sounds of 135 dB, and should be protecting their hearing every time they get behind the wheel. Law enforcement also face very loud noises, and a gunshot firing at close range is 140 dB. Working around these decibel levels requires the best in hearing protection, such as custom molded earplugs , or over the ear muffs.

Protecting Your Hearing

If you and your employees work on a noisy jobsite, protecting your hearing can drastically reduce your chances of hearing loss, and safeguard your hearing for years to come. Not only does exposure to dangerously loud sounds lead to hearing loss, it can also cause pain, headaches, stress, depression, tinnitus, and even insomnia. The pain threshold is 125 dB, and if your jobsite is louder than that, not only will your staff risk hearing loss, their productivity will be greatly reduced, and the chances of workplace accidents will increase.

The risk of hearing loss among these professionals is very high, so it’s your job to help your staff protect their hearing with the right hearing protection. The louder the noise, the faster you’ll experience hearing loss, and very loud sounds can cause immediate hearing loss. Make sure your staff isn’t facing prolonged exposure to dangerous sounds.

The type of jobsite you have dictates what kind of industrial hearing protection your employees need. For some, foam earplugs could be enough to keep everyone’s hearing safe. However, on noisy jobsites, earmuffs will provide far more protection, and create a safe seal around the entire ear. In some cases, it may be worthwhile to invest in digital hearing aids, that will allow you to hear soft sounds at a normal volume, but will automatically activate when you’re exposed to dangerously loud sounds.

Anadyne

Protecting your hearing, and the health of all your employees, has never been easier. At Anadyne we specialize in jobsite hearing protection, and we’ll even come to you. Call us to schedule the most convenient time, and we’ll test your workers’ hearing, examine the jobsite, and make suggestions on the best way to keep everyone’s hearing safe.

The post Noisiest Jobs in the World appeared first on Anadyne.

< Older Post

Newer Post >

Who Needs Annual Hearing Testing Next?

By Karrin Brandsen • 05 Apr, 2024

Who Needs Annual Hearing Testing Next? Testing large groups of employees is challenging on a good day! Keeping track of who has or hasn’t been tested by the 2 nd or 3 rd batch becomes even more daunting and chaotic for managers when you factor in New Hires, Terminations, and Shift Changes! That initial batch was easy but who’s still here for Round 2? That’s where Anadyne steps in! We take care of all those scheduling details and keep track of the testing, retraining, and reporting on our end. You are no longer required to stare at spreadsheets and draft endless lists! Anadyne will provide you with organized schedules which provide you all the necessary information. Anadyne helps alleviate your concerns regarding hearing conservation. We strive to make hearing testing as simple and stress-free as possible for your team! Questions? Call today to find out more: 888.972.4420

The 6 C's of Hearing Protection

By Karrin Brandsen • 07 Mar, 2024

6 C's of Hearing Protection: Anadyne provides custom hearing protection designed to exceed your expectations. By taking an impression of each ear, we ensure a perfect fit for everyone. These devices are the most compliant available and meet or exceed standards for CE, ANSI, NAL, and KC. Our hearing protection devices allow you to stay connected and protected. Communication is simple via radio, Bluetooth, phone calls, or face-to-face conversations without compromising your hearing health. The devices are incredibly convenient to use - simply insert them into each ear with the easy-to-grasp handle, and you're ready to go. Our hearing protection devices significantly reduce waste by eliminating throw-away foam plugs which are often seen littered around the facility. With the 6-year guarantee, and a lifetime of up to 10 years, these devices can save over 50% of your hearing protection costs. Anadyne believes in the 6 C's for the perfect hearing protection device: comfort, compliance, communication, convenience, clean & green, and cost-effectiveness. Questions? Call today to find out more: 888.972.4420

Are Your Clinic-Sourced Baselines Being Entered in Your Database?

By Karrin Brandsen • 07 Feb, 2024

Baselines and their purpose: As an employer, it's important to understand the complete process of getting a baseline hearing test for your employees. A baseline test is the test that establishes an employee's benchmark for future hearing test comparison. In many cases, OSHA allows up to 6 months for this, but by doing it earlier, it allows any pre-existing hearing loss to be documented. After the baseline test, hearing tests are conducted at least annually to monitor for any changes in the employee's hearing health. Wait, there's a few more steps! After obtaining a baseline test, there are more steps that employers need to follow for compliance. Once the baseline test is complete, the results need to be sent to the provider of record (if contracted out) so that they can be screened for any problems and entered into your company's hearing conservation database. This way, any unclear data, possible STS (Standard Threshold Shift), or recordable STSs (shifts in hearing levels that are significant enough to be recorded on the injury log) can be identified. By following through with these steps, you can ensure your company is complying with this part of the OSHA requirements. Questions? Call today to find out more: 888.972.4420

Follow-Up Deadlines After Annual Testing

By Karrin Brandsen • 05 Jan, 2024

Follow -up on non-recordable and recordable STSs: As an employer, it’s critical that you take the necessary steps and follow up deadlines regarding employees’ hearing testing. If an STS, or standard threshold shift, is identified during a hearing test, OSHA requires employees to be notified of the results within 21 days and ensure they receive re-training. An STS occurs when an employee’s hearing threshold changes enough at 2000, 3000, and 4000 Hz in one or both ears, in comparison to their baseline audiogram. STS’s recordable on your OSHA-300 log should be done within seven days of the hearing test. Risks that come with STSs and ways to lessen the risk: If the STS meets recordability, it can negatively impact things like the company’s risk matrix. Even if the STS is non-recordable, OSHA still requires that the employer retrains the employee. However, you can avoid false STSs or recordable STS issues by ensuring that immediately preceding annual testing, employees have not had a cold, have not been listening to loud music, and have not been wearing earbuds. Earbuds are not typically suited to the industrial workplace because their level of sound can exceed 85 dB and are not typically ANSI-rated as hearing protection. Why Anadyne? By investing in quality hearing protection and mobile hearing testing services, you can save time and money while ensuring your employees’ safety and your companies productivity. At Anadyne, we offer a tag team system that allows production to continue while employees are being tested, reducing downtime and interruptions. Quality hearing protection is critical because, while throw-away earplugs may be cheaper upfront, they are only good for one use. Anadyne’s hearing protection steadily pays for itself after the first year and saves you money in the long run. Taking the extra time to invest in quality hearing protection and mobile hearing testing services is essential for protecting your employees and your company. Don’t wait until it’s too late; make hearing safety a priority today. Call today to find out more: 888.972.4420

Are You Wondering When to Schedule Hearing Tests Without Disrupting Your Work and Deadlines?

By Wayne Brandsen • 07 Dec, 2023

Is your company struggling to fit all the tests into a few hectic days of the year? With the end of the year fast approaching, it's no secret that most companies are under pressure to meet deadlines and handle unexpected events. But don't let hearing tests be an added burden. The best time to conduct hearing tests depends on your company's field of work. Some industries may have busier seasons, while others are more regular throughout the year. However, with the holiday season just around the corner, it's easy to forget non-regular tasks such as annual hearing tests or re-tests. This can cause confusion, disruption, and inconvenience, especially when trying to fit all the tests into a few days. What is the solution? What if we told you there's a better way? Did you know Anadyne has a program to coordinate your hearing tests for the year, so you don't have to worry about whether everyone got done? This way, you won't miss any employees who might have been absent due to illness, vacation, or other reasons. So why wait? Schedule a consultation about hearing tests with Anadyne today to ensure a hassle-free 2024 for you and your employees! Call today to find out more: 888.972.4420

Mastering Employee Hearing Test Scheduling: Anadyne's Proven Approach

15 Oct, 2023

When you have several hundred employees, planning a testing schedule can feel overwhelming. Who should be first? What room or building should you start with? How do you approach such a daunting task? It gets messy quickly, especially with multiple shifts. Even worse is when you make a plan, you get it going, you’re trying to get through every hearing test in one week and the next thing you know people don’t show up. The truck leaves on Friday, and Friday’s schedule is already full. What now? It’s time to get Anadyne involved. This is what we do every day. We have a proven system that works. We know it’s difficult to interrupt production and interfere with workflow. Nobody wants to do it. We’ll take the heat for you. We make the schedule so there’s less pushback from your team. Should we sort it by last name, birth date, department, or shift? Let us walk you through it. We’ll take the head, do the scheduling, and help to reintegrate those that have missed. Alleviate these challenges by working with a trusted partner. Call today to find out more: 888.972.4420

The Importance of Hearing Protection Fit Testing

By Karl Brandsen • 29 Sep, 2023

The hearing rating shown on HPDs packaging is often inaccurate. When it comes to protecting our hearing in noisy environments, we often rely on the ratings provided on the packaging of earplugs and other hearing protection devices (HPDs). These ratings can be deceiving and may not accurately reflect real-world performance. In fact, the figure on the packaging is nothing more than a rough estimate of the protection you’re actually getting. While some users might achieve the stated level of noise reduction, many do not. This disparity in real-world effectiveness has led experts to emphasize the need of hearing protection fit testing. Fit testing is the key to bridging the gap between laboratory estimates of attenuation and the actual attenuation achieved by workers as they wear their protectors in their daily routines. Fit testing is the key to bridging the gap between attenuation estimates and the actual attenuation. So why is fit testing so essential? The answer is simple: it’s the only way to determine how much noise reduction a person actually gets from their hearing protection device. As mentioned earlier, the rating on the packaging can be misleading. It might provide a point of comparison between different products, showing that Product A offers more or less protection than Product B. However, relying on this rating, even if it is de-rated to account for real-world use, is not reliable when protecting your hearing. One of the primary reasons for the wide range of attenuation provided by any given earplug is the uniqueness of each individual’s ear canal and the way they insert the device. Factors like ear shape, size, and the method of insertion can significantly affect the earplug’s performance. That’s why it’s important to test HPDs on the individuals who will be using them. Hearing protection fit testing involves assessing how well an earplug fits within an individual’s ear canal. By doing this, you can determine the actual protection that person is receiving from the device. Fit testing takes into account the real-world variables that impact effectiveness, such as the seal between the earplug and the ear canal. This method offers a much more accurate representation of the protection provided by the HPD, tailored to the specific user. In conclusion, if you work in a noisy environment or use hearing protection regularly, don’t rely solely on the rating displayed on the packaging of your chosen device. Instead, consider the importance of hearing protection fit testing. It’s the only way to ensure that you’re getting the level of protection you need to protect your hearing. Investing in proper fit testing will preserve your hearing for years to come. Want to know more? Contact an Anadyne rep today.

Who Missed Their Hearing Test?

By Wayne Brandsen • 14 Aug, 2023

Coordinating hearing tests. It's complicated. If you work in a large organization, you know there’s inevitably employee turnover and a continual flow of people coming and going. This can make things complicated when it comes to hearing tests. The new people need hearing tests and those that have left are probably still on a list somewhere from your last hearing test. This leaves your safety team with the headache of combing through old records to figure out who needs a hearing test next. You need a program. That program is one of the reasons Anadyne exists. It takes a program to screen through all the old records and new records; finding out when hearing tests that were last done, reviewing the current employment roster and the like. You’re now left with the complex reconciliation task of finding out who has been tested already this year, what legacy employees have not been tested, and what new employees you haven’t gotten any data on. What a headache! We can help. We have a program for that. Anadyne can provide a complete schedule, clear list of names and everything you need to answer questions; that is who needs hearing testing next. Our team will meticulously comb through all your records and create a comprehensive list of current employees, including when they had their last test and who has never had a hearing test. This allows us to do the next step of our program; figuring out who most urgently needs to be tested and creating a schedule accordingly. No need to panic when the bus comes back. Anadyne coordinates everything for you. Want to know more? Contact an Anadyne rep today.

12300 SE Mallard Way Suite 120

Milwaukie OR 97222

Get A Free On-Site Consult

Resources