Smart Ear Plugs and Ear Muffs – Make It Your Choice

Smart Ear Plugs and Ear Muffs – Make It Your Choice In the work place, according to the World Health Organization, Noise Induced Hearing Loss (NIHL) is one of the most common occupational illnesses. According to Access Economics in its 2006 report ‘The Economic Impact and Cost of Hearing Loss in Australia’ one in six people suffer from hearing loss today and this will grow to one in four by 2050. Despite growing awareness of NIHL and compliance standards outlined by OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) stating that employers must devise a hearing conservation program and provide audiometric testing, which measures a person's hearing ability over time, the incidence of hearing damage is still more prevalent than it should be.

It is recommended that personal protective equipment such as earmuffs and earplugs be worn when workers are exposed to noise levels of 85dBA or above. But despite companies complying with national health and safety standards, it has been seen that workers exposed to high noise often do not consistently use hearing protection, this can be due to various reasons like ear plugs or ear muffs: · Inhibit their ability to communicate in high noise environments. · Interfere with workers situational safety · Are not comfortable to wear.

People working in such high noise environments use hearing protection devices (HPD) like earmuffs and earplugs that not only protect your hearing but also aid in concentration and focus. The performance of these hearing protection devices depends mainly on the size of the acoustic leak.

New innovative technologies released in recent years go a long way towards minimizing the size of the acoustic leak in both earplugs and earmuffs. Hearing protection devices already exist that can reduce background noise to safe levels, but still allow enough sound through to enable situational awareness .

Electronic earmuffs that connect to communication devices have been around for sometime but their capability to enable conversation in high noise has been limited. This limitation has been addressed by recent technologies that use smart algorithms to isolate speech from background noise. Unlike other noise suppression technologies, these technologies focus on isolating and enhancing speech at the same time as suppressing background noise to enable users to hear speech in high noise environments. Most importantly, the ability to enable face-to-face communication around damaging noise levels opens up new communication possibilities. This eliminates what research shows is the main reason workers remove hearing protection.

Thus new technology is now changing the effectiveness of hearing protection by delivering a functional alternative which is in line with most personal protection equipment available in the market today, which is critical for their safety.

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