Approaching to hearing health of Uruguayan academic musicians.

Abstract

Within the framework of an interdisciplinary research team, a first audiometric database of Uruguayan academic musicians (singers and orchestral musicians) was developed. Before performing a pure-tone audiometry on each of the musicians, an Occupational Physician conducted an interview (an anamnesis form with about 50 questions) and an otoscopy. Hearing loss was evaluated based on two criteria: one preventive (mean loss at 2000 Hz and 4000 Hz) and the other reparative (mean loss at 500 Hz, 1000 Hz, 2000 Hz and 4000 Hz). Both values were included -one at a time- as components of a vector per participant, along with 31 other variables preselected from the anamnesis. By performing Cluster Analysis and Principal Components Analysis (PCA), each set of 32 variables was reduced to a smaller one of 10 variables. The final sets differed in 1 of the 10 variables: in the first case, the history of having the mumps mattered; while in the other case, the tenth variable was the need to increase the volume on the TV.