Study of noise exposure and high blood pressure in shipyard workers.

A cross-sectional and case-reference study of occupational noise exposure and blood pressure was conducted in a shipyard company. There were 158 male workers from the higher noise environment (greater than 85 dBA) and 158 matched workers from a lower noise environment (less than 80 dBA). The workers in the higher noise environment had higher systolic and diastolic blood pressure (p less than .05) after adjusting for confounding factors. Comparison of regression revealed that there is no different increase in blood pressure with age in different environmental noise exposure. Based on 63 matched hypertensive-normotensive pairs from 2,730 shipyard workers, the relative risk of hypertension among workers exposed to an over-85-dBA acoustic environment, compared to those under 80 dBA, was 2.38. It is suggested that there may be a population of noise-exposed workers at increased risk of high blood pressure.