The WAHTS Team is Very Excited to Share Some Big News and Updates in the Occupational Hearing space
In October 2022, we submitted a letter of interpretation from OSHA regarding the use of the ANSI S3.1-1999 (R2018) Maximum Permissible Ambient Noise Levels (MPANLs) in lieu of the MPANLs in the occupational noise exposure standard: OSHA has confirmed that they will allow the use of the ANSI MPANLs!
What does this mean? This means that the ANSI-derived MPANLs now consider the attenuation of the headset, which means that the WAHTS can now be used in environments that no other system on the market can be used! The new OSHA Letter of Interpretation from October 22 allows the MPANLs to take into account the attenuation of the headset. The high passive attenuation of the WAHTS headset, particularly in the low frequencies make it the ideal solution for boothless audiometry, where low frequency ambient noise can interfere with hearing testing.
Why is this so important?
OSHA requires that hearing test environments meet specified values described as maximum permissible ambient noise levels (MPANLs). The new OSHA Letter of Interpretation “named…..” dated….. allows the MPANLs to take into account the attenuation of the headset. This means that WAHTS is an OSHA compliant system that can be used to assess occupational hearing in higher noise environments than any other system.
The WAHTS MPANLs outperform other transducers at 250, 500 and 1000 Hz, making WAHTS ideal for boothless audiometry, where ambient room noise is a concern. Visit the Audhere page to learn more!
For more information, see the letter of interpretation from OSHA below.