NIOSH Blog Series on Noise and Hearing Loss Prevention Wins NHCA Media Award

Contact: Christina Spring, (202) 245-0633

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)'s Hearing Loss Prevention Researchers are the recipients of the National Hearing Conservation Association's (NHCA) 2011 Media Award for a series of postings on the NIOSH Science Blog focused on noise and hearing loss prevention.

The NHCA Media Award was established in 1993 to recognize the efforts of writers and/or producers of news features that serve to heighten public awareness of the hazards of noise. The NIOSH Hearing Loss Prevention Researchers utilized the NIOSH Blog platform to engage partners and the public in scientific discussion about noise and hearing loss prevention. The group authored a series of 6 blogs on the topic, with three of them focusing on the entertainment and sports industries. CAPT. William Murphy, Hearing Loss Prevention Team leader, will accept the award at the 36th Annual NHCA Conference in Mesa, Arizona 2011.

"We are honored to receive this award for our work on promoting dialog with our partners on important occupational safety and health issues," said NIOSH Director John Howard, M.D. "By leveraging this new platform, we hope we can bring together the many voices on the issue of noise-induced hearing loss and not only raise awareness, but also find new ways for us to work together to eliminate this problem from the workplace."

The NIOSH Science Blog (http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/blog/) was first started in 2007 and has featured more than 65 unique topics since its inception. It has been visited more than 120,000 times and currently it has more than 25,000 subscribers. The mission of the NHCA is to prevent hearing loss due to noise and other environmental factors in all sectors of society. For more information about NHCA go to http://www.hearingconservation.org/.

NIOSH recommends removing hazardous noise from the workplace whenever possible and implementing an effective hearing loss prevention program in those situations where dangerous noise exposures have not yet been controlled or eliminated. For more information about noise and hearing loss prevention research at NIOSH go to http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/noise/abouthlp/abouthlp.html.