Hi,

We have recently employed a member of staff who wears a hearing aid on one ear and will be working within a mandatory hearing protection zone. Can anyone assist as to how we can afford him protection against further damage to his hearing but also ensure that he can hear such things as conversation, warning alarms etc which are critical to the process?

Thanks

^ industry

dohhhhh - for an edit function - or at least more time to read through what I post :)....

Marky

If the employee still has reasonable hearing in one ear, there's a good chance that he'll have the same hearing capacity as anyone with normal hearing while wearing appropriate ear muffs in noise protection zones. This comment is based on my own experience over many years of having one good ear and one poor one. Apart from having to turn my head to hear someone trying to talk into my poor ear, I experienced no problems and therefore didn't feel any need for a hearing aid for the poor one. This changed about 10 years ago when the hearing in my good ear diminished almost overnight and I became dependent on aids for both ears. Neither ear had been affected by excessive noise exposure, either through work or other circumstances, because I've never had significant exposure to such noise. Furthermore, I've generally always worn ear muffs for transient exposure to such noise, e.g. when visiting paper mills in my HSE days or occasionally using my chain electric saw in more recent years.

However, others with hearing problems are likely to differ in various respects, including degree of impairment and cause. Therefore, to echo good general advice on this forum regarding anyone with a medical condition or sensory impairment, it's important to have a discussion with the employee involved. This will help to avoid anyone making wrong assumptions about him through "does s/he take sugar? syndrome".

p.s. teh_boy - In regard to typing errors, I think you are correct when you mention the need to take more time to read through what you've typed before hitting the send button. I'm puzzled by pleas which forum users sometimes make for an 'edit' facility. Surely, we've all got inbuilt edit facilities commonly known as brains, eyes and fingers which are fairly effective when given time to look through draft postings and make necessary corrections! There's also the spellchecker facility at the top of the draft box. It can be quite useful for highlighting typing errors even though most of its suggested spelling amendments in my experience tend to be amusing rather than relevant.

p.p.s. In view of my comments about editing, I thought it best to check the above draft even more thoroughly than I usually check my forum drafts. The spellchecker didn't like 'Marky' and offered a selection of alternatives starting with 'murky'. As for 'p.s.' it suggested 'pus' ! :-)

Please tell me this is irony.

You have warning alarms.......... in a hearing protection zone?

teh boy....... its best not it's best.

Chuckle chuckle :)