How Much Daily Subway Noise Can Cause Hearing Loss?
You’ll be shocked to learn just how little daily exposure to subway noise can damage your hearing.
Do you ride the subway to work every day yet don’t wear protection in your ears to prevent hearing loss?
Protection can be earplugs or the type of ear “muffs” that you see industrial workers wearing.
“New Yorkers may not realize that their daily commute via subways may actually be exposing them to damaging levels of noise!” says Rivka Strom, AuD, CCC-A, chief audiologist at Central Hearing LLC in NY.
“While in the subway car noise levels reach 75-85 dB,” continues Strom. A dB is a decibel, a unit of sound volume. The higher the number, the louder the sound.
“Outside on the busy subway platforms there are large crowds of people, subway performers and multiple trains passing by at once. Here, the noise levels can reach from to 94 to 106 dB!
“At a level of 85 dB the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) says that a person should be exposed to this level of noise for a maximum of eight hours.
“At 94 dB the allowed amount of time becomes one hour, and at 106 dB the time becomes 3.7 minutes!
“We can see how extended periods of time in busy subway stations could be causing damage to your hearing.
“What’s important to keep in mind is the effect of noise exposure is cumulative.
“That means that throughout their day they may be exposed to varying levels of noise, often surpassing the allowable time limit.”
You Rely on the Subway for Transportation
Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health did research into how much daily subway noise can harm hearing: just 30 minutes a day.
The study included recording decibel levels of sound in NYC’s subway system.
Now before I go on about this study, I’d like to ask if you take pepper spray with you for protection — just in case should you need it while waiting on a subway platform or when in the train.
Just like you won’t go without your pepper spray, you should not venture into the subway without hearing protection. Yes, the noise is THAT potentially damaging.
The report (Journal of Urban Health, Sept. 2006) states that daily subway noise (and this includes on the platforms waiting for the trains, not just inside the trains), “has the potential to cause hearing loss.”
Highest Decibel Level on Subway Platform
The paper says it was 106 decibels.
In the study, greater than one in 10 subway platform measurements was louder than 100 dB; this means a time allowance of 90 seconds. Inside the cars, however, the noise was even louder.
Average maximum level of noise on a subway platform came in at 94 dB. The inside average was 95.
How loud is this?
- A chainsaw is about 100 dB, and a gunblast is 140 dB.
- Normal conversation is 45-60.
Will ear buds help?
Ear buds with music loud enough to drown out some of the subway noise will not offset the potential hearing loss from the train; it will make things worse, says the report.
Solution to Harmful Subway Noise
It’s simple. Wear ear plugs. Custom made ear plugs (available at audiology/hearing aid centers) are far superior to store-bought ones.
Noise cancelling headphones are another option.
Dr. Strom is a member of the American Speech Language and Hearing Association and has received several awards including Brooklyn College’s Excellence In Audiology Award.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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Top image: Shutterstock/ANDRANIK HAKOBYAN
Source: sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/10/061012185519.htm
Is Being Over Age 50 Too Old to Train for a Marathon ?
If you’re age 50 or older and are thinking of training for a marathon, here are reasons to go for it! (more…)
How Obese People Report Their Exercise Habits: Truth or Lie?
A study says that obese people exercise more than previously believed, but how objective were the patients at reporting their exercise habits? (more…)
How Personal Trainers Can Stop Clients from Talking So Much
If you’re a personal trainer, you probably have a client who talks too much during sessions.
Or, perhaps as a personal trainer, you haven’t had this problem, but are surely anticipating that sooner or later, you’ll get a client who keeps talking throughout the workout sessions. (more…)
Why Most Personal Trainers Don’t Teach HIIT to Their Clients
HIIT is a very useful tool for fat loss, time-saving cardio exercise and better heart health.
Yet few personal trainers actually instruct this to their clients. Why is this?
There’s more than one reason why most personal trainers don’t have their clients doing HIIT.
Perhaps you’ve recently learned about HIIT and are skeptical of its claims simply because you hardly ever see, if at all, any personal trainers having their clients perform this kind of exercise.
Reasons Very Few Personal Trainers Teach High Intensity Interval Training
#1. Not up-to-date on research. The research (e.g., Gibala et al, Talanian et al) that proves HIIT is superior to fat-burning than is steady state cardio is actually beginning to get old.
Amazingly, many personal trainers are unaware of this research and still cling to the myth that the best way to lose weight is to jog or pedal at a medium or slow pace nonstop for an hour.
HIIT also benefits fitness and heart health.
Studies, such as Buchan et al and Rakobowchuk et al, show that high intensity interval training beats out traditional aerobics for heart health and boosting overall health. More personal trainers need to know this.
#2. Don’t want to bother teaching it. Teaching high intensity interval training is a lot more challenging than simply telling a client, “On your non-weight training days, make sure you do at least 30 minutes of cardio.”
Personal trainers need to take the time and tolerate the tedium of instructing HIIT.
I see too many personal trainers having their overweight clients spend a lot of time on the floor doing various body-position holds or balancing acts, when instead they can be on cardio equipment for just 20 minutes of HIIT and reap enormously more benefits.
However, this requires work on the part of the personal trainer.
The PT needs to convince the client that 20 minutes of HIIT burns much more fat over the next 24 hours than does 60 minutes of steady walking, jogging or pedaling.
Of course, after 20 minutes of high intensity interval training, the client won’t need a lecture. My clients have told me that it was the hardest 20 minutes they’ve ever exercised.
Shutterstock/Iam_Anupong
Another issue is that of pep-talking the client. Some clients will whine and gripe during this form of exercise, and many personal trainers don’t want to deal with this.
I’ve had my clients warm up on a treadmill, elliptical machine and revolving staircase in preparation for their first HIIT session – and they had no idea what was coming.
But I found it fun, rather than tedious, to stand by their side and operate the settings of the machine, giving them pep talks as well as explanations of why HIIT is so effective.
For the clients who preferred the revolving staircase, I’d be standing on the one next to them to reach their control settings.
It was all worth it. They learned a form of exercise they never knew existed, and it helped them become more tuned in to what was happening to their body during hard exercise.
Personal Trainers Owe It to Their Clients to Teach HIIT
Teaching HIIT must be hands-on – an actual session – rather than just handing your clients a printout from your favorite fitness site of how to do HIIT.
- Make sure the client does not have any medical conditions that contraindicate exercising much harder than they’ve ever done before.
- Very overweight clients can do HIIT, but scaled down – to what would be better termed as just “interval training.”
- Their HIIT sessions should be on their favorite cardio equipment. If they can’t make this choice, then select a mode that best fits their condition. For example, a morbidly obese client would do better on a recumbent stationary bike than on a revolving staircase.
High intensity interval training WORKS. It’s been proven, time and time again. The fact that few personal trainers instruct HIIT should not dissuade you from doing it.
Links to the HIIT Studies
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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Top image: Shutterstock/OSTILL is Franck Camhi
Are You a Runner with a Hamstring Injury? Treatment Option
If you haven’t injured a hamstring from running, it’s only a matter of time, so at least get ahead of the game and know how to prevent these and how to treat this injury should you fall victim to it.
I injured my hamstring from running; my hamstring injury is healed. So here is my article on treatment options for hamstring injuries as they apply to runners. (more…)
Minimum Steps You Should Take Every Day for Health Benefits
Perhaps you’ve seen a lot of articles pushing for 10,000 steps a day to gain health and fitness benefits, but is this the minimum requirement?
What if you can’t figure out a way to accumulate 10,000 steps every single day?
A study of this determined that the daily step total should be lowered to 6,000.
The report is in the November 2012 Menopause, and states that at least 6,000 steps a day will contribute to better health, though the study focused on middle-aged and older women rather than the general population.
Life as a couch potato is harmful to the body, and the more that you move in daily life, the healthier and fitter you’ll be.
If you’re sedentary and want to be healthier, start by wearing a pedometer to attain 6,000 steps a day.
Though relying ONLY on step totals is not the best approach to health and fitness, it IS a great way to get launched towards a fitter and healthier lifestyle.
The 6,000 steps a day is also highly applicable to those folks who are indeed committed to ongoing strenuous exercise — but for the remainder of the day are very sedentary, spending hours and hours at the computer or watching TV.
These individuals should tally daily step totals with a pedometer outside of their structured exercise sessions.
The Study
It involved 292 women (45 to 72) who wore pedometers.
The cutoff point for daily step totals was 6,000: Women who took fewer than 6,000 steps a day were deemed inactive.
All the women had health checks that included blood sugar, waist/hip measurement and cholesterol profile.
The women whose pedometers recorded over 6,000 steps a day were far less likely to be obese or have diabetes or metabolic syndrome, when compared to the inactive women.
Whether or not they’d gone through menopause or had hormone therapy did not influence results.
Tips on Accumulating 6,000 Steps Per Day
I have a treadmill desk and know firsthand how valuable this tool is for accumulating steps throughout the day.
For instance, when it’s time to peruse news sites for the latest stories, you can do this while walking slowly on the treadmill desk.
You can also pace about the house during TV commercials if you watch shows in real time.
If you strength train at a gym, walk around between sets instead of sitting on the equipment.
If you think someone might take the equipment while you’re walking away from it, then confine your steps to close-by.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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Source: sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/11/121121130821.htm
Best Kinds of Exercise for Depression and Weight Loss
Exercise fights depression and weight loss, and one study after another confirms the strong tie between exercise and alleviation of depression symptoms.
A Southern Methodist University study shows that exercise is a potent treatment for depression and anxiety.
Before you start a workout program, the study authors recommend a health assessment to clear the patient for physical activity.
The general recommendations for exercise apply to depressed but apparently healthy people.
This means 150 minutes weekly of moderate-intensity exercise, or, 75 minutes of vigorous exertion.
But which will work better for depression, and weight loss: 150 minutes of moderate-intensity, or 75 minutes of rigorous exercise a week?
Go for the 75 minutes, hands down. Intense exercise causes hormonal changes in the body that trigger weight loss in the form of fat lost, while keeping valuable muscle tissue intact.
Moderate level workouts fail to do this. Intense exercise that elicits the best hormonal response is the kind called high intensity interval training, as well as a kind of exercise called burst training.
A 2002 issue of the Journal of Applied Physiology reports that high intensity training, involving sprints, produced 96 percent more human growth hormone when compared to slower long duration jogging.
Growth hormone release creates breakdown of fat, which means weight loss.
Other benefits include increased energy, increased libido and improved sleep, and these improvements will go a long way in alleviating symptoms of depression.
People with depression, including depression caused by weight loss struggles, can begin by walking…the anaerobic way, for maximum weight loss. However, include strength training in your regimen. Don’t just do cardio.
Shutterstock/Syda Productions
Strength training, like cardio (walking, running, cycling) can be done intensely. Intense exercise helps alleviate depression simply because it creates a feeling of accomplishment.
You’ll be much more amazed at yourself after doing high intensity interval training as opposed to mere, boring long duration cardio like prolonged boring pedaling on an elliptical machine or endless laps walking around the block.
Another type of exercise that will fight depression and encourage weight loss is the martial arts.
Martial arts, by their nature, involve bouts of intense training, or burst-style training.
Plus, the sense of accomplishment will be unlike anything you’ve ever experienced; I’ve trained in the martial arts for years, and it just feels so great developing skills in this discipline.
And weight loss will be a sure result, and this of course will help relieve your depression, as you become fitter.
Lorra Garrick has been covering medical, fitness and cybersecurity topics for many years, having written thousands of articles for print magazines and websites, including as a ghostwriter. She’s also a former ACE-certified personal trainer.
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Source: Southern Methodist University (2010, April 6). Mental health providers should prescribe exercise more often for depression, anxiety, research suggests. ScienceDaily. Retrieved January 6, 2011, from http://www.sciencedaily.com¬ /releases/2010/04/100405122311.htm
Top 3 Exercises to Prevent Osteoporosis in Women Over 50
Women who are over 50 and postmenopausal can scare off osteoporosis with just these three exercises.
For women over 50, especially postmenopausal, osteoporosis looms, but you can keep this disease far away from you with just three exercises.
Even if you’re new to strength training, and even if you feel “totally out of shape,” you can make these three exercises do wonders for your bone density.
The top three exercises for preventing osteoporosis in women 50 and older:
#1. Deadlift
#2. Squat
#3. Bench Press
These exercises are “top 3” material when it comes to so many things, including prevention of osteoporosis, and including causing dramatic improvements in the health and fitness of women age 50 and over.
A report from the International Osteoporosis Foundation warns that postmenopausal women need to take the threat of this disease very seriously.
Osteoporosis is what turns a once erect, healthy looking woman into a “little old lady” who’s lost a lot of her height.
The IOF report notes that postmenopausal women are at most risk for the fallout of osteoporosis which includes bone fractures.
One-third of all women over 50, says the IOF report, will suffer a fractured bone due to this disease.
Deadlift, Squat, Bench Press
Even if a woman is postmenopausal, it’s NEVER too late for strength training to strengthen the bones.
Deadlift. Shutterstock/Everyonephoto Studio
Squat. Freepik.com
Bench press
Shocking
The report also says that bone fractures result in more time spent in a hospital than does breast cancer, for women over 45.
How can the top three exercises for 50-plus women strengthen bone and help prevent osteoporosis?
They force contractions of multiple, large muscle groups.
When a muscle contracts, it pulls on the bone to which it is attached (it’s attached via a tendon). This pulling on the bone forces the bone to increase in density.
Lorra Garrick is a former personal trainer certified through the American Council on Exercise. At Bally Total Fitness she trained women and men of all ages for fat loss, muscle building, fitness and improved health.
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Top image: BruceBlaus/CreativeCommons
Source: sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/10/131010091653.htm
Best Strength Training Exercises for People over 90
