§ 49-gg. Determination of damage risk criteria and standards for the
measurement of occupational loss of hearing. The chairman of the
workers' compensation board is authorized and empowered to, and shall,
appoint and consult with a committee or committees of not less than
three nor more than nine outstanding expert consultants familiar with
the various aspects of the problem of industrial noise and occupational
loss of hearing for the purpose of developing their recommendations as
to the most reliable and acceptable damage risk criteria and standards
for the measurement and determination of occupational loss of hearing.
Such recommendations shall include but shall not be limited to the
subjects of (a) what industrial noise levels may cause occupational loss
of hearing, (b) frequencies to be used in measuring industrial hearing
loss, (c) the point below which there is no hearing disability and the
point above which the inability to hear shall be deemed total, (d) the
use of a monaural or binaural method of computing the percentage loss of
hearing, (e) proper deductions for presbycusis and other non-industrial
causes of deafness and being hard of hearing, and (f) the number of
examinations needed to evaluate industrial hearing loss and the fairest
method of determining the loss from the results of successive
examinations. The committee or committees of expert consultants so
appointed by the chairman shall meet and confer with representatives of
the workers' compensation board and with representatives of employers
and employees, and shall thereafter report their findings and
recommendations to the workers' compensation board. The workers'
compensation board, after giving due consideration to such findings and
recommendations, is authorized to adopt reasonable rules, not
inconsistent with the provisions of this chapter including without
limitation section forty-nine-hh of this article, and the labor law,
prescribing damage risk criteria and standards for the measurement and
determination of occupational loss of hearing. Pending the formulation
and adoption by the workers' compensation board of such rules, claims
for occupational loss of hearing shall be determined upon the basis of
the tentative standards and criteria contained in the report, dated
December, nineteen hundred fifty-three of the committee appointed by the
workers' compensation board and entitled "Report of the Committee of
Consultants on Occupational Loss of Hearing."