SalsaTO
"Hey! What did ya just say?" you shout at your friend in the salsa club. The music is sort of loud and you are talking much louder than normal to be heard. Or after the night is over and you are checking your cell phone calls, you can barely hear them. Yet before you went to the club you were able to hear you phone perfectly. Or you feel exhausted, even though you did not dance all night non stop or drink the bar dry.
If that is happening to you, you might be at risk of suffering some permanent hearing loss, or you are experiencing temporary hearing loss - which can become permanent over time if exposure to the loud sound continues.
Once you lose some of you hearing, it is gone, forever. It does not come back.
Sound is measured in decibels (dBA). And hearing loss is a combination of the loudness of the sound and the amount of time you are exposed to the loud sound.
The threshold of damage from loud sound starts at 85 dBA.
Averaging over a week, exposure to 85 dBA for 40 hours a week poses the same hearing risk as being exposed to 88 dBA for only 20 hours, 91 dBA for 10 hours, 94 dBA for 5 hours, 97 dBA for 2.5 hours, and just over one hour each week at 100 dBA. The louder the sound, the less time you are can be exposed to it before hearing damage can occur. But is not a straight line relationship. The hazards to hearing double with each 3 dBA increase.
How many hours are people out dancing salsa - 2, 4, 6, 8 hours?
Here are the sound levels of some common things we are exposed to.
A whisper is 30 decibels, while a conversation can be 60 decibels. A vacuum cleaner, hair dryer, and a car can clock in at 70 decibels. Traffic noise is 80 decibels.
A noisy restaurant clocks in at 85 decibels. The TTC Subway clocks in over 90 decibels, same for some of their busses. Headphones can clock in from 105-120 decibels. Movie theatres can blast you at 117 decibels.
Nightclubs can be as loud as 120 decibels.
Clues for Hearing Loss
You are exposing yourself to permanent hearing loss when you:
How do you know you may have some hearing loss?
Early signs of hearing loss include:
Protecting Your Hearing.
In general, you have to protect your hearing as no one else will. You can purchase and use earplugs which will reduce the level of sound getting to your ear. Wear them when riding in a convertible, or using power tools, even running a lawnmower. Wear them when you are exposed to any loud music such as in a night club or at a concert.
You can still hear your friends talk at the loud club or the live music concert. And you can still hear and feel the loud music. You are just reducing the intensity or the level of the sound that gets to your ear and are reducing the risk of permanent hearing loss.
Taking a five minute rest period for every hour of listening to allow ears to recover.
You can also try stay away from the speakers or the walls where sound may reflect from. The farther away you are from the source of the loud sound, the lower the level of the sound that gets to your ear.
Taking regular breaks from the dance floor and using chill out areas to give ears a rest from loud music.
Talking to the DJ may not help. Promoters have instructed their DJs to turn the sound up as they could still hear people talking over the music. So, the bottom line is protect yourself.
That said, get out there, listen to every band in ear shot, dance the night away in the clubs, just protect your hearing.
For more information about hearing loss read the references below.
Resources
Health Canada
Health Canada Noise Information
Canadian Hearing Society
General Hearing Loss Information
Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety
Canadian Workplace Noise Safety Standards
Don't Lose The Music - RNID Hearing Protection Program
Don't Lose the Music
RNID - UK Based Hearing Protection Design Contest
RNID Press Release