Association of occupational noise exposure, bilateral hearing loss with hypertension among Chinese workers

Objective: To evaluate the relationship of occupational noise, bilateral hearing loss with blood pressure and hypertension among a Chinese population. Methods: We included 15 422 individuals from a cross-sectional survey of the key occupational diseases in 2017 in Wuhan, Hubei Province, China. Occupational noise exposure was evaluated through workplace noise level and/or the job titles. Hearing loss was defined as a pure-tone average of 25 dB or higher at speech frequency (0.5, 1, 2 kHz) or high frequency (3, 4, 6 kHz) in both ears. Hypertension was defined as blood pressure at least 140/90 mmHg or self-reported current use of antihypertensive medication. Results: Compared with participants without occupational noise exposure, the prevalence of hypertension was significantly higher for noise exposure duration of 5 to less than 10 years [odds ratio (OR) = 1.13, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.04–1.27] and at least 10 years (OR = 1.17, 95% CI = 1.09–1.30). In the sex-specific analysis, the association was significantly pronounced in male (OR = 1.18, 95% CI = 1.06–1.32 for duration of 5 to
Source: Journal of Hypertension - Category: Cardiology Tags: ORIGINAL PAPERS: Blood pressure epidemiology Source Type: research