噪声致听觉系统损害的研究进展

Auditory health effects induced by noise exposure

噪声是最主要的隐形环境污染源之一,长期持续的噪声暴露严重影响人类的身心健康,尤其是听觉功能。噪声性聋(noise induced hearing loss,NIHL)是最常见的获得性感音神经性聋之一,常年位居全球职业病之首[1-4]。随着工业、交通、城市建设的不断发展,噪声污染日益严重。据世界卫生组织统计,在成年耳聋患者中,16%的耳聋归因于噪声暴露[5];

Noise is one of the most common environmental and occupational exposures,and noise-induced hearing loss(NIHL)has become the leading occupational disease,secondary to the age-related hearing impairment.It is a significant cause of disability and a major cost to the society.Three characteristics of NIHL have been thoroughly established through numerous studies.First,noise-induced threshold changes increases with noise intensity and duration of exposure.Second,difficulties in speech discrimination and temporal processing even in the presence of normal behavioral thresholds in the subjects with a history of noise exposure.Third,individual susceptibility to noise along with the degree of hearing loss varies greatly among population.NIHL is a complex disease resulting from the interaction between environmental and genetic factors.And much of the literature on NIHL is derived from cross-sectional studies,providing limited evidence for the natural history of the noise exposure.Then,it is urgent to explore the development tendency and identify the susceptible frequencies of NIHL through large-scaled longitudinal study,and provide a new method for estimating individual susceptibility to NIHL.