Motorcycle noise exposure among students in an institutional higher learning / David Jud Marcus Josue

Each year, the number of registered motorcycle increased where at least 1 % of them will involve in road accident. From the one 1 %, at least a total number of 10,000 motorcyclist will be injured and killed every year. Helmet is proven to provide protection for motorcyclist (Chang et al., 2003). There has been little discussion on the consequences of wearing motorcycle helmet and the noise exposure. This study aim to identify the noise exposure among motorcyclist. The method used in this study is by placing the microphone personal dosimeter to the motorcyclist inside the helmet near to their ears and take a ride of their motorcycle while their noise exposure is recorded by the dosimeter. Besides, the motorcyclist hearing will also be test through the audiometric test. The personal noise exposure and motorcycle noise emission found to be significant between the compliance and non-compliance of the regulation with the p­ value of 0.01 for personal noise exposure and p-value of 0.00 for motorcycle noise emission. There are no significant differences in the noise threshold at each frequency between expose group and control group. This shows that both the group has suffers from hearing loss. However, there is an association for the expose group to develop hearing loss once exposing to the noise with the p-value of 0.04 and the relative risk score 1.65 (> 1 ). The current stridies found that most of the permissible noise emission from the motorcycles is below the standard. As if the current reading is compare with the European Union (EU) standard, all of the noise from the motorcycle found to be exceeding the permissible limit with the reading of above 77 dB (A). Malaysian guidelines should be revising with the current situation as the guideline is not as better as the European guidelines so that the development of hearing loss among motorcyclist can be prevented. The mechanical of the motorcycle engine and current motorcycle helmet available should be revised with the current issues.