Not sure if this is the right sub for this, if not I'll remove it.
I work at a homeless shelter. This morning, the fire alarm went off and my coworker and I had to evacuate the building. The alarm is piercingly loud and painful. Neither of us knew how to silence it, or if we even should, since the alarm turning off would make people think they didn't have to evacuate. So we spent probably 10 to 20 minutes herding people out of the building. Now, about eight hours later, my ears are still ringing. We were also never trained on what to do in case of a fire. The training I received was “the disaster plan booklet is located in this closet, read it at some point.” The plan was written for the location I was working at this morning, but when I read the plan, I was working at a different location and had no reason to think I'd ever be scheduled somewhere else, so I didn't read the parts that were location-specific too closely.
So I'm worried that I've sustained some level of permanent hearing damage, and I'm not sure if I can get any compensation for it, or how I'd go about that, for a few reasons.
-not sure how I'd prove hearing damage, since I didn't have a baseline hearing test
-not sure how I'd file for workman's comp, since it's not like slightly worse hearing will make me unable to work
-I don't have a primary care doctor so I can't ask a doctor if i should get my hearing tested or how I'd go about that
I know that if I'm going to do anything, sooner is better than later, so I'd appreciate some advice.