A University Nursing School researcher has received a nearly $600,000 award to study hearing loss among Latino construction workers in the United States.

Madeleine Kerr will use the funds for three years to develop and evaluate a hearing-loss prevention program geared toward Latino workers.

The grants came from the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communications Disorders, a division of the National Institutes of Health.

The National Institutes of Health estimates that one in four Latino construction workers will experience job-related hearing loss.

Kerr has conducted such research for non-Latino workers. The new project will focus on Latinos because they now comprise 17 percent of the U.S. construction workforce.