Dental professionals have more Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and regulations than ever before, yet one issue has remained silent: hearing loss.
If hearing loss were considered a disability, it would rank as the highest in the world, affecting more than 25% of the population. Clinicians can directly identify colleagues who have lost hearing in one or both ears, yet what are we doing about it? Noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) plagues our profession, is 100% preventable, yet our regulatory bodies have not pushed hearing protection as standard of care. This has left us at significant risk, and we should be very concerned.
Compared to other health professionals, dentists have significantly worse hearing. This holds true for all ages and genders when compared to the general population. Our hearing capacity is equivalent to people decades older than our age brackets. One big reason: hearing loss is cumulative over time. While we may only spend 25 minutes per patient using a high-speed handpiece, suction or ultrasonics, we do this multiple times a day, spanning an average career of 35 years. This exposure slowly does damage and we don’t notice the signs until it’s too late, similar to patients when it comes to being aware of the presence of caries or periodontal disease.
Exposure to chronic NIHL reduces productivity, increases stress, and interferes with concentration. It can lead to significant systemic health issues like cardiovascular disease and depression. Our bodies react with sympathetic and endocrine responses, deteriorating overall health. The American Dental Association and numerous publications have recommended hearing protection since 1974.
Why have we ignored the warnings? Our best counter to this risk is prevention via hearing protection, which has been limited in the past. Traditional foam earplugs result in significant muffling of sounds and the inability to communicate; studies show this as the primary reason protection has been avoided. Solutions like noise-canceling headphones are not practical for our environment and again eliminate communication. Passive plugs with filters are an improvement, but still filter sounds regardless of whether they cause damage.
In the end, we need something that protects us while simultaneously not affecting our ability to hear and communicate. The technology is available and known as active hearing protection. Using a tiny electronic microchip, the damaging sounds are instantly isolated and compressed to lower levels while still maintaining an “open ear” response, resulting in 100% HD hearing. Communication remains unaffected, while hearing damage is prevented. With this technology, we truly have a solution to solve our noise exposure issues. This type of hearing protection has been developed in the music industry and construction. It’s time we take a stand and begin seriously addressing dentistry’s deafening silence. While fretting over the newest bonding agents, we continue to lose our hearing daily. The responsibility to take action is ours. New ideas have their initial hesitations, but nothing has significant ramifications to our health like NIHL. Ultimately, it’s not a question of if, but rather when and how much our hearing and quality of life will be affected by our profession.
References available on request.
This article was originally published through the Academy of Osseointegration, osseo.org.