Journal of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, Volume. 42, Issue 7, 793(2025)

Roles of A- and C-weighted kurtosis adjustment for equivalent sound level in evaluating occupational hearing loss

LIU Haiying1,2, WU Linjie2, LI Yang2, LI Jinzhe3, XIN Jiarui2, ZOU Hua4, QIU Wei5, SHEN Tong1, and ZHANG Meibian1,2、*
Author Affiliations
  • 1School of Public Health, Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230032, China
  • 2National Institute for Occupational Health and Poison Control, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing 100050, China
  • 3Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing 100013, China
  • 4Zhejiang Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Hangzhou, Zhejiang 310051, China
  • 5Yangtze River Delta Research Institute of Tsinghua University, Zhejiang, Jiaxing, Zhejiang 314006, China
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    Temporal kurtosis (without frequency weighting, i.e., Z-weighted kurtosis) can evaluate noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL). However, few studies have considered the function of frequency weighting (A- or C-weighted) kurtosis on NIHL.ObjectiveTo study the significance of A- and C-weighted kurtosis adjustment for equivalent sound level (L′EX,8 h) in evaluating occupational hearing loss.MethodsA cross-sectional survey was used to select 973 noise-exposed workers in seven industries as the subjects. The noise exposure of all workers was assessed by distributions of A-, C-, and Z-weighted kurtosis (e.g., KA, KC, and KZ) and respective adjusted equivalent sound level (e.g., L′EX,8 h-KA, L′EX,8 h-KC, and L′EX,8 h-KZ). The significance of A- and C-weighted kurtosis in evaluating NIHL was evaluated by correlations between three types of L′EX,8 h and NIHL, and improvement of noise-induced permanent threshold shift (NIPTS) underestimation predicted by the ISO prediction model (Acoustics—Estimation of noise-induced hearing loss, ISO 1999-2013).ResultsThe median KA, KC, and KZ were 68.33, 28.22, and 19.82, respectively. The binary logistic regression showed that LEX,8 h-KA, LEX,8 h-KC, and L′EX,8 h-KZ were risk factors for NIHL (OR>1, P<0.001). The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve showed that when the outcome variable was noise-induced hearing impairment (NIHI), the areas under the curves corresponding to L′EX,8 h-KA, L′EX,8 h-KC, and L′EX,8 h-KZ were 0.625, 0.628, and 0.625, respectively. When the outcome variable was high-frequency noise-induced hearing loss (HFNIHL), the areas under the curves corresponding to L′EX,8 h-KA, L′EX,8 h-KC, and L′EX,8 h-KZ were 0.624, 0.623, and 0.622, respectively (P<0.05). The order of underestimation improvement values predicted by L′EX,8 h for NIPTS1234 was: L′EX,8 h-KA (4.68 dB HL)>L′EX,8 h-KC (4.38 dB HL)>L′EX,8 h-KZ (4.28 dB HL) (P<0.001). The order of underestimation improvement values predicted by L′EX,8 h-K for NIPTS346 was: L′EX,8 h-KA (7.20 dB HL)>L′EX,8 h-KC (6.83 dB HL)>L′EX,8 h-KZ (6.71 dB HL) (P<0.001).ConclusionThe adjustment of A- and C-weighted kurtosis to equivalent sound level LEX,8 h can effectively improve the accuracy of the ISO 1999 prediction model in NIPTS prediction, and compared with the C-weighted, the A-weighted kurtosis can improve the result of the ISO 1999 prediction model in terms of underestimating NIPTS.

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    LIU Haiying, WU Linjie, LI Yang, LI Jinzhe, XIN Jiarui, ZOU Hua, QIU Wei, SHEN Tong, ZHANG Meibian. Roles of A- and C-weighted kurtosis adjustment for equivalent sound level in evaluating occupational hearing loss[J]. Journal of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, 2025, 42(7): 793

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    Paper Information

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    Received: Nov. 11, 2024

    Accepted: Aug. 25, 2025

    Published Online: Aug. 25, 2025

    The Author Email: ZHANG Meibian (zhangmb@niohp.chinacdc.cn)

    DOI:10.11836/jeom24548

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