Poissenot-Arrigoni Bastien, Martin Laurence, Negrini Alessia, Berbiche Djamal, Doutres Olivier, Sgard Franck
Department of Mechanical Engineering, École de Technologie Supérieure, ÉTS, Montréal, Canada.
Département de Médecine, Université de Montréal, Montréal, Canada.
Int J Audiol. 2025 Apr;64(4):392-401. doi: 10.1080/14992027.2024.2352045. Epub 2024 May 28.
Evaluate the ability of an extended version of the 3 M Eargage to estimate the earcanal size and assess the likelihood that a particular earplug can fit an individual's earcanal, ultimately serving as a tool for selecting earplugs in the field.
Earcanal morphology, assessed through earcanal earmolds scans, is compared to earcanal size assessed with the extended eargage (EE) via box plots and Pearson linear correlations coefficients. Relations between attenuation measured on participants (for 6 different earplugs) and their earcanal size assessed with the EE are established via comparison tests.
121 participants exposed to occupational noise (103 men, 18 women, mean age 47 year).
The earcanal size assessed with the EE allows for estimating the area of the earcanal's first bend cross-section (correlation coefficient = 0.533, < 0.001). Extremely large earcanals (12.7% of earcanals in our sample) lead to significantly lower earplug attenuation (potentially inadequate) than smaller earcanals.
The EE is a simple and inexpensive tool easily deployable in the field to assist earplugs selection. When extended with sizes larger than the maximum size of the commercial tool, it allows for detecting individuals with extremely large earcanals who are most likely to be under-protected.
评估3M Eargage扩展版估计耳道大小的能力，并评估特定耳塞适合个体耳道的可能性，最终作为在现场选择耳塞的一种工具。
通过耳道耳模扫描评估的耳道形态，与通过扩展耳规（EE）评估的耳道大小进行比较，采用箱线图和皮尔逊线性相关系数。通过比较测试确定参与者佩戴6种不同耳塞时测量的衰减与其通过EE评估的耳道大小之间的关系。
121名接触职业噪声的参与者（103名男性，18名女性，平均年龄47岁）。
用EE评估的耳道大小能够估计耳道第一个弯曲处横截面的面积（相关系数 = 0.533，P < 0.001）。与较小的耳道相比，极大的耳道（我们样本中12.7%的耳道）导致耳塞衰减显著降低（可能防护不足）。
EE是一种简单且廉价的工具，易于在现场部署以辅助耳塞选择。当扩展到大于商业工具最大尺寸的尺寸时，它能够检测出耳道极大且极有可能防护不足的个体。
