Noise and Heart Attack Risk

I read an interesting article this morning:

Traffic Noise Causes Heart Attacks

Whilst traffic noise and laminate flooring impact noise are two different kinds of noise, it is interesting (and rather worrying) to note the similarities - invasive, erratic, irregular and outside the control of the person being subjected to the noise.

Also, as noted in the article, "the researchers found that there was a 40 percent higher risk of a heart attack in people exposed to traffic noise exceeding 50 decibels — a relatively quiet level of noise;" The noises that I experience from the laminate flooring above me are generally louder than the traffic noise from the busy road outside. I would love to see a study done into the actual effects of laminate flooring noise on health - a study that takes the 2005 DEFRA Study a step further than simply saying "laminate flooring creates a noise problem but all we are going to do is produce a leaflet no-one is obliged to adhere to, evern if they bother to read it."

The World Health Organisation (WHO) have produced studies on the effects of noise on health. They also raise the issue of noise creating heart attack risk ~

"Acute noise exposures activate the autonomic and hormonal systems, leading to temporary changes such as increased blood pressure, increased heart rate and vasoconstriction. After prolonged exposure, susceptible individuals in the general population may develop permanent effects, such as hypertension and ischaemic heart disease associated with exposures to high sound pressure levels (for a review see Passchier-Vermeer 1993; Berglund & Lindvall 1995). The magnitude and duration of the effects are determined in part by individual characteristics, lifestyle behaviours and environmental conditions. Sounds also evoke reflex responses, particularly when they are unfamiliar and have a sudden onset." (Section 3.4 Cardiovascular and Physiological Effects)

It is not a huge leap of the imagination to suggest that people jumping, running, thumping, banging, door slamming and dancing on laminate flooring - ie force feeding random, loud, impact noises into a neighbour's property are in fact risking their neighbour's lives.

Why is there no legislation about this type of noise?

Noise Injury - Ears, Audiology and Hearing Impairment

Craig Mixon, Ed.D, has published a comprehensive chart/poster called The Symptoms & Side Effects of Force-Feeding Noise into the Domestic Environment. Clicking on that link brings you to a pdf file of the document where you can read, download or print the poster. It is disturbing stuff but it clearly illustrates the possible effects of living with noise in the home.

Is the noise from laminate flooring being force fed?

My opinion is yes - because the victim of the noise pollution has no control over the noise. The persons who control the noise are the persons who do not adequately soundproof the flooring and who are intentionally or unintentionally force feeding noise into someone else's domestic environment.

Semantics aside - the real fact is the people are living in their homes and being subjected to impact noise on a daily basis and they are at risk of developing Noise Injury.

As the chart shows, there are many ways in which noise can injure a person - both physically, emotionally and psychologically. In researching this article I realised that I could not properly cover Noise Injury in one entry and decided to break down Noise Injury into a series of articles covering the various topics. It seems logical to begin with the ears, hearing and auditory injury since this is the most obvious and recognisable route into the body that noise takes.

The Handbook of Clinical Audiology describes three changes in hearing due to noise:

• Noise induced temporary threshold shift (NITTS)
  
• Noise induced permanent threshold shift (NIPTS)
  
• Acoustic Trauma

Noise Induced Temporary Threshold Shift

Have you ever noticed the way your ear feels or reacts when someone bursts a balloon close to you? You might experience a sense of your ear filling up, temporary reduction in hearing others sounds and you may even experience tinnitus/ringing in the ears. This is noise induced temporary threshold shift and it is the way the ear deals with some sounds.

In relation to the impact noise created by laminate flooring, a person may experience NITTS many times in a day over a long period of time. The Handbook of Audiology finds that if the NITTS exceeds 20dB* and/or the exposure is moderate but occurs over an extended period of time then recovery may be delayed.

Noise Induced Permanent Threshold Shift

NIPTS occurs when there is a lack of recovery from NITTS and is a slow and progressive condition. It may take years of repeated exposures before the person is aware of any change in hearing ability - by which time the damage is done and it is too late.

Acoustic Trauma

It is unlikely that laminate flooring noise would result in Acoustic Trauma since the range of noise prevalent in causing acoustic trauma is 2000Hz and 6000Hz and is outside the range of documented sound produced by laminate flooring.

Tinnitus

Tinnitus is best described as ringing in the ears when there is no external sound stimulus. It is associated with noise induced hearing loss.


It is not unreasonable to consider the possibility that long-term exposure to the intermittent impact noise created by laminate flooring could result in damage to hearing.


*DEFRA find that noise levels produced by laminate and hardwood flooring surfaces range between 59 dB and 72 dB