Everyone's Health

Sports, Sounds like good advice

Are you killing your hearing? or more?

Excessive exposure to loud sounds is the leading cause of preventable hearing loss. Most of the damage is work-related, but a growing and significant source are popular devices like iPods and cell phones played too loudly.

Now, a pair of Canadian researchers say hearing damage can occur even if the exposure to loud sounds is relatively brief. In this case, from attending games during the 2006 Stanley Cup hockey championships.

William Hodgetts and Richard Liu measured sound levels inside the Edmonton Oilers arena during games 3, 4 and 6 of the team's series with the Carolina Hurricanes. They also assessed hearing function before and after game 3 in Liu and his wife.

They found that decibel levels exceeded 100 for all three games. Medical standards say an average level of 85 decibels over eight hours is the maximum allowable exposure to noise without the threat of hearing damage. Every three decibels over 85 cuts the time you can safely be exposed to that sound in half.

Thus, the researchers determined the actual maximum safe dose of sound in all of the games was about six minutes. A hockey game, of course, lasts much longer.

Hodgetts and Liu concluded that attending boisterous games – hockey, football or some other noisy public event – poses a real but underappreciated threat to hearing.

Their recommendation: Go ahead and cheer, just don't forget the earplugs.

Kind of makes you wonder what else high volumes can do to your body...

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