South Australian Numbered Regulations South Australian Numbered Regulations67—Noise induced hearing loss (section 188 of Act)
(1) For the purposes of section 188(4) and (5) of the Act, the following procedures apply for the purpose of establishing whether a worker is suffering from hearing loss that may be noise induced:
(a) the worker must first undergo an audiometric test of hearing conducted by—
(i) a medical practitioner; or
(ii) an audiologist; or
(iii) an audiometrist;
(b) in addition to an audiometric test, a legally qualified medical practitioner registered in the speciality of otorhinolaryngology, or approved by the Corporation, must carry out a physical examination of the worker (and any other appropriate investigation that the medical practitioner considers necessary) to determine whether the worker's hearing loss is noise induced or is due, or partly due, to ear disease or other causes of hearing loss and must, having regard to the results of the audiometric test of hearing, determine the noise induced hearing loss of the worker as a binaural noise induced hearing loss expressed as a percentage loss of hearing.
(2) For the purposes of subregulation (1)(a)
—
(a) an audiometric test must include air-conduction and bone-conduction pre-tone threshold measures with appropriate masking; and
(b) air-conduction testing must comply with the requirements of section 7—Audiometry and section 8—Audiometric test procedures of AS/NZS 1269.4:2005 Occupational noise management—Part 4: Auditory assessment; and
(c) bone-conduction testing must comply with the Audiological Society of Australia Professional Standards of Practice; and
(d) during an audiometric test, the hearing levels of the worker must be determined at audiometric test frequencies, 500, 1 000, 1 500, 2 000, 3 000 and 4 000Hz with an audiometer calibrated to the reference specified in AS IEC 60645—1:2002 Electroacoustics—Audiological equipment, Part 1 Pure tone audiometers (IED 60645 —1:2001, MOD) and AS/NZS 1591.1:1995 Part 1: Reference zero for the calibration of pure tone bone conduction audiometers, and the instrumentation for bone conduction audiometry must also comply with AS/NZS 1591.4:1995 Part 4: A mechanical coupler for calibration of bone vibrators; and
(e) if noise induced hearing loss is diagnosed, the hearing levels of the better and worse ear must be determined at each audiometric test frequency and, using the hearing levels obtained, a percentage loss of hearing must be read at each audiometric test frequency in accordance with the appropriate tables so as to obtain 6 values of percentage loss of hearing, and those 6 values of percentage loss of hearing are to be added together to obtain the binaural percentage loss of hearing; and
(f) if the worker is a man of or over the age of 56 years or a woman of or over the age of 69 years, the value in table P set out in Appendix 5 of NAL Report No 118 appropriate to the worker's age and sex must be subtracted from the binaural percentage of loss of hearing obtained in accordance with the procedure set out in paragraph (e)
.
(3) For the purposes of section 188(4) and (5) of the Act, noise induced hearing loss is a prescribed injury.
(4) In this regulation—
"appropriate tables" means tables RB-500 to RB-4000 (inclusive) set out in Appendix 3 of NAL Report No 118;
"audiologist" means a person who is either a full member, or eligible to be a full member, of the Audiological Society of Australia and who holds, or is eligible to hold, a Certificate of Competency of the Society;
"audiometrist" means a person who is either an ordinary member, or eligible to be an ordinary member, of the Australian College of Audiology;
"Hz" means Hertz where 1 Hertz equals 1 cycle per second;
"NAL Report No 118" means the report entitled Improved Procedure for Determining Percentage Loss of Hearing published by the National Acoustic Laboratories in January 1988 (ISBN 0 644 06884 1).