Auditory Differences in Occupationally Noise-Exposed Workers With Normal Conventional Audiograms: A Multi-Measure Surveillance Approach

Young adults with normal conventional audiograms may nonetheless show early noise-related auditory differences that routine surveillance misses. We evaluated a clinically feasible test battery using 280 occupationally noise-exposed workers and 100 age-matched low-noise controls (20-40 years; ≤20 dB HL at 0.5-8 kHz)....

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Standard audiograms alone are insufficient to detect early noise-induced auditory damage in occupationally exposed workers; audiologists conducting occupational surveillance should consider adding supplementary measures (e.g., extended high-frequency audiometry, DPOAEs, or speech-in-noise testing) to their protocols.

This study strengthens the case for expanding occupational hearing surveillance beyond conventional audiometry, which could lead to earlier identification of noise-induced cochlear damage before permanent threshold shifts appear.

1. 01Workers with normal standard audiograms still showed measurable auditory differences when additional tests were applied.
2. 02A multi-measure surveillance approach detected subclinical hearing changes missed by conventional audiometry.
3. 03Published in Trends in Hearing, a peer-reviewed journal focused on audiology research.
4. 04Findings have direct implications for occupational hearing conservation program design.
5. 05Early detection may enable timely intervention before irreversible hearing loss develops.

PMID

42567542

DOI

10.1177/23312165261477842.

Journal

Trends in Hearing

Publication type

research_article

Evidence level

2b

Population

Occupationally noise-exposed workers with normal conventional audiograms

Intervention

Multi-measure auditory surveillance (including measures beyond conventional pure-tone audiometry)

Comparator

Conventional audiogram alone