Increasing the Use of Hearing Protection Among Farmers: Best Practices

Last updated on December 18th, 2024 at 04:32 pm

Farm operators, as well as farm youth, experience frequent exposure to high noise and have among the highest rates of hearing loss among all categories of workers. Additionally, noise exposure impacts multiple organ systems, contributing to cardiovascular disease, hypertension, obesity, and other highly prevalent diseases. Although the effects of noise can be mitigated through use of hearing protection and other strategies, these methods are highly underused in this worker group. Nurses in a variety of clinical settings who provide care for farm operators and farm youth are in a unique position to influence the noise mitigation behaviors of this high-risk and underserved group. In this webinar designed for nurses caring for workers in production agriculture, learners will discuss methods of assessing worker exposure to hazardous noise, and evidence-based nursing approaches to protect workers from the negative effects of noise on hearing and worker well-being.

At the end of the webinar, participants will be able to:

1. Discuss several risk factors for noise-induced health problems common among farmers.
2. Describe major features of interventions shown to be effective in influencing farmers’ use of hearing protection.
3. Discuss best practices for clinical application of farm noise mitigation effectiveness research.

 This training has expired. Let us know if you’d like us to schedule it again!