REVIEWS   

Minerva Medicolegale 2002 December;122(4): 177-82

Copyright © 2002 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: Italian

Medicolegal observations on noise-induced hearing loss worsening

Albera R.

The evaluation of hearing loss evolution over time has always been a controversial topic. Until now the criteria followed were based on the comparison of the level of inability calculated on audiograms carried out on the subject. In the medicolegal practice, according to the author's opinion, the noise-induced hearing loss worsening evalutation should be preceded by a clinical and audiometric analysis in order to demonstrate the professional origin of hearing loss and to exclude that the threshold worsening could be due to the inter-test variability. Only if these conditions have been satisfied it is possible to calculate the new grade of inability on the basis of the hearing threshold level of the last audiometry.