Hearing Loss & Cognitive Decline
If you have even mild hearing loss, the following scenario will likely be familiar to you: You go out to a restaurant/bar to meet some friends or family. There’s some music playing in the background and there are eight or ten of you around a table. You’re having a hard time picking up what is being said. Even the people who are seated closest to you seem like they’re mumbling through the din of the background noise. You try to keep up, but everyone is talking much faster than you’re able to put together what they’re saying. You think to yourself, “Did she just say ‘peach’ or ‘beach?’ She’s talking about swimming, so probably ‘beach.’” While you went through that logic exercise, two more sentences have been spoken and you got none of them. Pretty soon you give up, maybe you just smile and nod while the conversation swirls around you. You feel exhausted while everyone else is in good spirits and seems to have more energy than ever. After a little while, you excuse yourself and go home, worn out, frustrated, and feeling lonely even though you just passed a couple of hours with some of the people who are closest to you. The next time you have the opportunity to go out, the same thing happens. The time after that, you make up an excuse not to go. You find yourself spending more and more time at home. Does this sound like you?Hearing Loss & Your Overall Health
Hearing loss is one of the trickiest problems we face as we get older, and it can sometimes be hard to determine what are the effects of hearing loss and what are separate age-related conditions. Studies in recent decades have found that hearing loss tends to promote a lot of other problems, if it is left untreated. As we naturally find social timeless enjoyable, we tend to shy away from it more and more often, as in the scenario above. Over time, the lack of social experiences can result in loneliness, depression, and social isolation. While it isn’t clear exactly why yet, another consequence of untreated hearing loss is a higher risk of cognitive decline and dementia. Intuitively, it makes sense. We use our brains to navigate social situations and take in lots of information from the world. When our ears are no longer providing enough information to our brains, over time, cognitive decline can set in. It really seems true that we must “use it or lose it.”Higher Rates of Cognitive Decline and Dementia
Even though we’re not entirely sure why this happens, the statistics are clear. Hearing loss is the biggest modifiable risk factor, out of twelve, for eventually developing Alzheimer’s or dementia. Mild hearing loss makes a person twice as likely as a normal-hearing person to experience cognitive decline. Moderate hearing loss makes one three times as likely, and severe hearing loss makes one five times as likely to experience cognitive decline and dementia. Researchers are quick to note that hearing loss is not a guarantee of cognitive decline. If your risk for dementia is low, even five times that low risk will still be very low risk. But, nonetheless, the risk is there.Hearing Aids Can Help
Evidence is mounting that treating hearing loss with hearing aids all but eliminates the increased risk of dementia that hearing loss brings with it. This is because hearing aids do exactly what is required: deliver more information to the brain. They keep us using our brains! The hearing aids of today are much more sophisticated, powerful, and enjoyable to wear than the hearing aids of the past. They can separate background noise from speech, connect wirelessly to smartphones and other devices, and even allow you to take a hearing test right through a smartphone app. It’s never been easier or more rewarding to use hearing aids! When asked after one year, over 90% of those who wear hearing aids say they are glad they got them. Hearing aid wearers tend to report more self-confidence, more independence, and a greater sense of optimism about their own futures… as well as the future of the world in general! They tend to spend more time outside the house, have more rewarding social relationships, and be in better physical health than those with untreated hearing loss. Wearing hearing aids is not just about trying to prevent the cascade of negative health outcomes that comes along with untreated hearing loss. It’s about actively improving your life, and making sure you get the most out of every day. If you or a loved one is dealing with untreated hearing loss, make an appointment for a hearing test today and find out what hearing aids can do to improve your life!
Communicating with People Who Have Hearing Loss
It is a well-studied phenomenon that hearing loss interferes in personal relationships. As communication becomes more difficult, friends, partners and loved ones can experience frustration just as much as the person who has hearing loss. For communication to be effective, all parties must participate in facilitating better communication styles. It’s not simply enough for the person with hearing loss to get hearing aids, or the people with normal hearing to “stop mumbling.” By keeping some things in mind, everyone can be understood, allowing our relationships to deepen and communication to flow freely, even while hearing loss is at play. If you have a partner, friend, loved one or co-worker with hearing loss, keep these tips in mind and you’ll be sure to have more successful communication going forward. In addition, be sure to ask the hearing-impaired person if there’s anything you can do that they have found to be especially helpful in conversation.- Visual communication is extra important for those with hearing loss. We usually rely somewhat on body language and facial cues in the course of a conversation, but these become even more important when hearing loss is an issue. People with hearing loss also tend to start reading lips. Make sure to face the person with hearing loss directly, rather than trying to speak into their ears. It’s more important that they see your face than that they hear your voice a little bit louder, which might only make their hearing aid distort.
- Make sure there’s plenty of light, and if it is directional, make sure it is shining on your face, not the hearing-impaired person’s face.
- Keep your hands from blocking your face. Eating, chewing gum, smoking, or otherwise occupying or covering your mouth while you talk is going to make it more difficult for the hearing-impaired person to understand you. Keep in mind that beards and mustaches may also reduce a hearing-impaired person’s ability to understand you.
- Facemasks make communicating with the hearing impaired much more difficult. While it is important to use facemasks in order to prevent the spread of disease, it may be more helpful to back up a few feet in order to achieve social distance, rather than to sit closer while wearing a mask. Ask the hearing-impaired person their preference on this issue.
- Don’t try to speak from another room. Always make sure you have the hearing-impaired person’s attention before you begin communicating. Say their name and wait for a response, or gently tap them on the shoulder. Don’t start speaking until you’re facing one another.
- Enunciate, but do not break into a shout. You can speak louder than normal, but use a speaking voice. Shouting can distort hearing aids and make your words more difficult to understand. Shouting also makes your mouth look different, which will make it harder to read your lips.
- Speak slowly, but do not draw out your words. Just add a little extra space between them.
- If you’re communicating a lot of information, add small breaks between sentences. Periodically, ask the hearing-impaired person if they’re following what you’re saying. They may need you to say something again, so give them space to ask for that.
- If the hearing-impaired person has asked you to repeat something you’ve said, try saying it in a different way rather than simply repeating the same word or phrase more loudly. By changing up your phrasing, you’re giving the person with hearing loss more “raw material” to use to put together the context clues and understand what you’re getting at.
- Hearing loss makes it much more difficult to understand speech when there is background noise. Even a small amount of hearing loss will be much more difficult for a person when there is noise. Try to have important or longer conversations in a quiet, well-lit area. If you’re in a loud group setting and need to communicate something important, ask the hearing-impaired person to move to a quieter space with you.
- Hearing loss can paradoxically make people more sensitive to loud sounds. This happens because of a phenomenon called “recruitment” that happens in the inner ear. Be aware that especially loud sounds may be really uncomfortable for a hearing-impaired person.
- If you’re providing specific information—such as an address, telephone number, date, etc.—write it down whenever possible. If you can’t provide a hard copy of the information, ask the hearing-impaired person to repeat it back to you so you can make sure they’ve understood correctly. Many numbers, such as “fifteen” and “fifty,” sound very similar and are easily confused.
- Hearing loss is exhausting. Understand that a person with hearing loss is working much harder than a normal-hearing person to keep up a conversation. They will likely become tired sooner.
Tips for Communicating if You Have Hearing Loss
One of the biggest problems we face when hearing loss becomes an issue is the difficulty we have in our relationships with those closest to us. Partners, friends and co-workers may experience frustration just as much as we do as a result of our hearing loss. While they will likely need to adopt some new methods of communication in order to facilitate conversation with us, there are also some things that we, as the hearing-impaired parties, can do to make communication go more smoothly.- It may start to happen naturally, but a bit of lip reading can go a long way. We always rely on body language and facial cues to help us understand one another, even when both parties have normal hearing, but it becomes especially important when we have hearing loss to get that extra information from a person’s face. If someone isn’t facing you while they speak, let them know you are hard of hearing and ask them to make sure that you can see their face while they talk.
- Background noise makes understanding speech that much harder. Try to remove distracting noises from your home environment when you have company. If you’re meeting in public, ask to meet at a place that doesn’t play loud music, or at a time when it won’t be at its busiest. If you’re in a group conversation and someone begins to say something especially important, ask to move to a quieter space to have the conversation.
- Whenever there’s a short break in the conversation, paraphrase what has been said and repeat information back to the other party to ensure that you’ve heard them correctly.
- Don’t pretend to hear when you can’t! While it may be tempting to simply pretend that you’re hearing in order to let the conversation move forward, it’s pointless and can result in embarrassing or even devastating miscommunications. If you can’t hear a person well enough, change the situation so that you can understand them, or ask them to write down what they’re saying.
- Be patient. Frustration is normal when communication is difficult, but if you can find a way to make communication possible, your social life doesn’t have to end just because you can’t hear as well as you used to.
Hearing Aids Can Help
Hearing aids are by far the best and most common treatment for hearing loss. The goal with hearing aids is to deliver more information to the brain, and that will not only make your communication easier with others, but keep your brain health in good shape going forward. As we go through life leaving our hearing loss untreated, changes start to happen in the brain. Over time, the auditory cortex will actually atrophy, and when you do get hearing aids, you’ll still need some time to build it back up before you can understand speech. By getting hearing aids as soon as they’re recommended by an audiologist, you’ll be able to live your life uninterrupted by hearing loss. The hearing aids of today are better than ever. They’re sleeker, smaller, and much more powerful than the hearing aids our parents wore. They can separate speech from background sound, allowing you to follow a conversation much more easily. They can employ directional microphones to make the sound in front of us much louder than ambient sound. They can even connect wirelessly to smartphones and other devices to stream phone calls and other media content, and even control programs and volume from an app. Some models even allow you to take a hearing test and have your fitment adjusted remotely, right through the app. The toll that hearing loss takes on our relationships is well-documented. Study after study confirms that hearing loss becomes a frustrating stressor in partnerships, marriages, friendships and workplaces. We all need to do our part to make sure that we can overcome hearing loss to maintain healthy social relationships, which are a major part of living a long, healthy life. While it’s important for the people in your life to do their part to facilitate communication, getting a good set of hearing aids is the best way to make the whole project much, much easier! If you or a loved one is dealing with untreated hearing loss, make an appointment for a hearing test today and find out what hearing aids can do to improve your communication, your relationship, and your life!
Treating Hearing Loss Helps You Stay Socially Connected
According to the AARP, 17% of people aged 65 and older are socially isolated. 46% of women over 75 live alone. Recent research has found that feeling lonely puts us at a 26% increased risk of early death. Another study showed that feeling lonely (even if you see people regularly, but feel that they don’t understand you) is as physically harmful as smoking 15 cigarettes per day. Untreated hearing loss is strongly correlated with loneliness and social isolation. It makes sense, doesn’t it? When we can’t hear people, it’s very difficult to feel connected to them. Conversations move slower, people need to speak differently to try to accommodate our hearing loss, and we simply can’t keep up. In the early stages of hearing loss, we usually experience social fatigue after a much shorter time than usual. Some people mistake this fatigue for a separate age-related condition—”I can’t stay out as long as I used to.” In fact, the extra mental effort it takes to strain to hear, especially in a busy environment, makes us mentally exhausted much sooner than we’re accustomed to. From this point, many people recognize that they have a hearing issue. They make an appointment for a hearing test, and may be advised to get a set of hearing aids. This is the right thing to do! Hearing aids keep us in the conversation, help keep our brains sharp, and help us stay connected to those we care about. Unfortunately, this is not the norm. On average, people tend to wait seven years from the time they notice hearing loss to the time they do something about it. This is likely because they don’t understand the risks of leaving their hearing loss untreated, or don’t understand what is to be gained from a good set of hearing aids.Being Around People Doesn’t Mean We’re Not Lonely
In order to feel connected, we need to be part of the conversation, not just in the same room. If we have hearing loss, we can be surrounded by family and friends, but still feel left out. Others chat away while we can only hear when someone speaks directly into our ear. With a set of hearing aids, we can be more present with everyone in the room, and be more aware of what’s happening. Hearing aids have been shown to increase feelings of social connection, as well as confidence and independence. Feeling connected and not being lonely doesn’t necessarily mean we always need to be around people, and hearing aids help give us the independence to choose when we want to see others and when we need some alone time.It’s Not Enough to Hear “Some of the Time”
While most people consider their hearing very important to them, the rate of hearing aid adoption does not seem to reflect that. This is partly because many people believe that it’s enough to be able to hear when “necessary.” For example, if your partner says loudly in your ear, “It’s time to go!” It’s easy for us to think that being able to hear the important things means that we don’t need hearing aids. Unfortunately, the science does not back this up. Even if we were able to hear everything that was said to us, but we couldn’t hear anything else, we would be in trouble. Our brains take in all kinds of information from the environment through our ears: birds chirping, fridges buzzing, feet shuffling, distant sounds and close sounds of all volume levels. These sounds feed our brains information that keeps our cognitive abilities in good order. When it comes to our brains, it really is true that we have to “use it or lose it.”Hearing Aids Are Better Than Ever
Hearing aids today are technological marvels, housing tiny computers that are powerful enough to distinguish between speech and background sound, reduce reverberation from speech, connect via Bluetooth to smartphones and other devices, and even automatically recognize the characteristics of different environments and switch to the appropriate program. Some hearing aids can even use GPS to automatically return to a program that previously worked in a given space. While hearing aids are more powerful than ever, they also take less effort to use than ever! If you or a loved one is having hearing issues, don’t hesitate to make an appointment for a hearing test today. Find out what’s going on with your hearing ability and take the right steps to keep yourself in the conversation and stay connected!
Working with Hearing Loss
Today in America, there are about 48 million people dealing with some type of hearing loss. For those in the workforce, hearing loss can create communication issues that can slow down productivity, affect the path of their careers, and even cause mental health problems. Fortunately, it doesn’t have to be that way! By keeping a few things in mind, you can reduce the stress of trying to do your job while negotiating with hearing loss.Ask for Reasonable Accommodations
The Americans with Disabilities Act ensures that employers must make reasonable accommodations for employees with all kinds of disabilities, including hearing loss. Talk to your employer about what you need to do your job most effectively. It could be as simple as having a microphone at the table during meetings, sitting closer to a visiting speaker, or moving your desk away from noisy workplace appliances. It can be crucial to make sure that people talk in turns, and a meeting moderator who knows that you have hearing loss will be able to remind everyone to do that. You might also ask that meetings take place at a round table, or another situation that allows you to see everyone’s face when they speak. If one conference room tends to be noisier than another (for example, if it’s closer to the kitchen), you can ask to hold meetings in a quieter space. Whatever you can think of to ease communication between you and your coworkers is worth trying out!Disclose Your Hearing Loss
In order to take advantage of the protections offered by the ADA, your employer needs to know that you have hearing loss. Your coworkers can also participate in facilitating your work as long as they, too, know about your hearing loss. Positive, forthright, polite disclosure helps everybody to understand the little steps they can take to make sure you’re included in the conversation. If you’re having trouble hearing someone, you can say, “I’m having trouble hearing you with my hearing loss. Can you please face me when you speak and talk a bit more slowly?” Once your workmates understand what they can do to help, most of them will start doing it automatically whenever you speak with them.Prepare in Advance
While everyone benefits from advance preparation, it can be especially helpful for those of us with hearing loss. You’ll be able to follow along much better in meetings if you know the agenda in advance, so ask to have it emailed to you prior to the event. It may also be helpful to have a notetaker present, who can provide you with the minutes afterward in case you need to revisit something.Use Assistive Technology
If you meet in larger groups, it can be a lot harder to hear than in smaller discussions where everyone can be physically nearer to each other. In larger conference rooms, a loop system can be helpful. Members of the group each have a microphone, which is sent to an amplifier that feeds a loop of wire that surrounds the room. The audio signal can then be picked up by a receiver, or a set of hearing aids with T-coil capability. A similar but more transportable option could be an FM system. Talk to your employer about obtaining these technologies. Other technologies can translate spoken words into text, like Computer Assisted Real Time Transcription (CART). Choosing to email when possible, rather than call or stop by a coworker’s office, can also be helpful. Video calls might be more beneficial than phone calls, so you can see the other person’s face. Lean in to the technology around you!Try Hearing Aids
Even if you’ve tried them before and didn’t find them useful, you’d be surprised how much the technology has advanced in the last few years. Most hearing aid manufacturers offer a trial period, so don’t be afraid to give them another shot! Current models of hearing aids can do a very good job of distinguishing between speech and background noise, and even altering their program automatically as you move through different environments. If discretion is a concern for you, hearing aids are available that are invisible or nearly invisible. Don’t let hearing loss affect your performance at work. Try out a set of hearing aids today and see just how great life can sound!
How Untreated Hearing Loss Interferes with Your Relationships
If you have hearing loss, or are partnered with someone who does, you may already have a sense that hearing loss can put a strain on a relationship. We all know that hearing loss makes it hard for the person who is dealing with it, but it also puts a lot of stress on those who are close to that person. Untreated hearing loss forces us to make all kinds of decisions based not on what we want to do, but what we have to do in order to accommodate hearing loss.Relationship Difficulties with Hearing Loss
Hearing loss is a well-studied phenomenon, and new information is discovered on a regular basis about how age-related hearing loss causes changes in our brains, and in our lives. Of course, there is a deep connection between the way we interact with our partners and what happens inside our brains. In a study published in The Hearing Review in 2019, researchers noted that “both the hearing-impaired participants and their close partners bemoaned the loss of spontaneity and the difficulties of sharing small, unexpected incidents, observations and small talk in their everyday interactions.” Those who get hearing aids know what it’s like to “hear the world” again. All of the little sounds we encounter in the course of a day—birds chirping, feet shuffling, fridges buzzing—provide our brains with information that helps keep our brains healthy. It’s really true that we must “use it or lose it.” That’s what treating hearing loss is all about: getting information to our brains. Our relationships are much the same. It’s not just about hearing the most “important” things we have to say to each other. There are a thousand little ways we interact in the course of a day: commenting on things we see or hear around us, cracking jokes, telling each other about something we read, the list goes on. When communication becomes more difficult, we naturally start to communicate less. And when we communicate less, our relationships start to suffer. We lose the feeling of intimacy that we once had. In fact, a survey of about 1,000 British participants found that 33% had argued with their spouse as a direct result of hearing loss. Miscommunication is always frustrating, but a lifestyle of miscommunication can be intolerable, especially when we know there is something that can solve the problem.Hearing Aids Can Help
Hearing aids are not just for the people who wear them, but also for everyone they interact with regularly. Aside from the numerous benefits that hearing aids have been shown to have for brain health, physical health, and emotional well-being on their own terms, they also help make life easier for the people we spend most of our time with. Hearing aids allow us to go to a restaurant and have a good conversation together, rather than having the conversation completely swallowed up by background noise. They let us enjoy a morning together, talking about the news of the day or our plans for the afternoon. They allow us to feel more confident and independent, which allows us to feel more connected to our partners rather than tied to them. Studies have shown that 95% of people say they are glad they got hearing aids, when asked after the first year of wearing them. Hearing aids are tied to greater feelings of social connection—not just with our spouse but with our broader social network. That helps us feel more secure, confident, and optimistic. In fact, people who wear hearing aids tend to report having a more optimistic view of the world in general, not even just their own lives.Hearing Aids Are Better Than Ever
Hearing aids are not the big, whistling gadgets of the past. Today’s hearing aids are sleek, powerful, and filled with marvelous technology. What’s more, the stigma associated with hearing aids is all but gone: as people are living longer, we expect nearly everyone to require some hearing amplification at some point in their life. Hearing aids today connect with smartphones, automobile computers, tablets and more. They favor speech over background sound, improving the listening experience in countless different types of environments. Some can even automatically detect when you have moved from one type of sonic environment to another, and switch their program with no input from you. As hearing aids seem more and more complicated, they paradoxically become easier and easier to actually use. If you or your loved one is dealing with hearing loss, make an appointment for a hearing test today and find out what hearing aids can do not just for you, but for the quality of your relationship.
Avoiding Hearing Tests Could Make the Problem Much Worse
When you go to a doctor for a checkup, they usually don’t give you a hearing screening. We make regular visits to the medical doctor, the eye doctor, and the dentist—but not to the audiologist. Yet, in a recent AARP poll, 75% of respondents said their hearing health was extremely important or very important to them. Clearly, there is a mismatch between the importance that Americans place on their hearing and the amount of attention we give to it.Regular Hearing Tests
The Better Hearing Institute and ASHA (The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association), both non-profits, suggest that a person should receive a hearing test once every decade until age 50, and once every three years after that. Those in higher-risk professions, or who are at a higher risk for hearing loss due to medical or family histories, should be tested even more frequently. Likewise, if you are an avid gun enthusiast, woodworker, musician, or otherwise spend a lot of time in high-noise environments, hearing testing should be a regular priority.How Hearing Tests Help You Stay Healthier
Hearing screenings (quick checkups to make sure you do not have hearing loss) and hearing tests allow you to keep better track of your hearing health over time. You can identify that you are starting to show early signs of hearing loss while you are still well within the range of normal hearing. If these signs appear, it’s an indication that you need to do a better job of protecting your ears in high-decibel-level situations, and perhaps take additional steps to reduce your modifiable risk factors for hearing loss. Some steps you can take that have been shown to reduce the risk of hearing loss include:- Protect Your Ears – Any time the ambient sound is at or above 85 dBA (decibels A-weighted), protect your ears or move to a safe distance.
- Turn Down the Earbuds – It can be hard to tell just how loud our headphones or earbuds are effectively presenting sound to our ears. As a rule of thumb, set the volume just loud enough to be able to listen comfortably. The maximum volume on most any personal listening device will cause permanent hearing loss in a relatively short amount of listening time!
- Quit Smoking – Your risk of hearing loss goes up significantly in proportion to how many cigarettes you smoke per day. Of course, quitting smoking has numerous health benefits, but it should also be noted that smoking greatly increases your risk of hearing loss.
- Eat Healthily – A study by Brigham and Women’s Hospital found that those who closely followed an anti-inflammatory diet—high in vegetables, fruits, legumes, and olive oil; and low in red and processed meats—were dramatically less likely to experience hearing loss over a four-year period around age 60.
- Exercise – Get that blood flowing! Aerobic exercise, even just walking regularly, has been shown to increase blood flow and help provide necessary oxygen and nutrients to the tiny cells responsible for your hearing ability.
Some Hearing Loss May Be Unavoidable
While these are important things to do to minimize your risk for hearing loss, it may still be the case that you experience hearing loss in the course of your life. Researchers at the Stanford Initiative to Cure Hearing Loss have found that there is a genetic component to every kind of hearing loss, but genes are not the whole story. It’s better to have moderate hearing loss than profound hearing loss, and your lifestyle and use of hearing protection can make all the difference. If you do have hearing loss, it’s best to start wearing hearing aids sooner than later. Even with mild hearing loss, people report memory issues, “tuning out,” and struggle with early fatigue in social situations. As hearing loss progresses, deeper issues such as brain atrophy will commonly develop. It’s really true that you need to “use it or lose it” when it comes to your brain’s ability to hear. A good set of hearing aids can make up the difference and prevent hearing loss from taking over your life. If you or a loved one is having issues with hearing loss, or if you’re due for a hearing test, make an appointment today. Start keeping track of your hearing health and make sure you’ve got the tools necessary to promote your best health and well-being!
Addressing Hearing Loss May Improve Care of Older Adults
Those with hearing loss know how difficult it can be to communicate when there is a lot of background noise. Most have been in a restaurant or public space when noise levels were high, and communication became difficult or impossible. While hearing aids have advanced a lot in terms of their capabilities, it’s not always the case that we have them on hand. Nowhere is this more problematic than in the hospital, where noises swirl in the air while doctors try to communicate with patients about what is happening to them. Unfortunately, it isn’t always the case that a person is wearing their hearing aids when a medical emergency arises, and in many cases medical staff will remove hearing aids while administering to them. Even worse, some patients have hearing loss but do not wear hearing aids. Indeed, those who fare the worst in a hospital environment tend to be lower-income patients without access to the hearing aids that would help them to navigate the hospital environment better.Studies On Communication Issues in Hospitals
A study from New York University in New York City found that those who self-reported having difficulty communicating with doctors while hospitalized were 32% more likely to return to the hospital within one month. The study included 4,436 patients, aged 65 and older, who were admitted to the hospital at least once between 2010 and 2013. By their own assessment, 12% of individuals said they had a hard time hearing what their doctors and other medical staff were saying. These tended to be older patients of lower socioeconomic status. The phenomenon has been noted in the course of other studies, as well. Communication difficulties also tend to be associated with greater health concerns generally, and a poorer self-reported rating of health. It’s difficult for hospital staff to communicate with patients who are hard of hearing, especially when these patients are in denial about hearing loss. The louder the staff raises their voice, the more they’re likely to distort and increase discomfort while remaining misunderstood. A doctor raising their voice can also sometimes violate HIPAA’s privacy standards.Hearing Loss Is a Two-Way Street
It’s clear that we all need to do as much as we can to ensure that hearing or other communication is a realistic possibility for those who don’t know sign language. On the part of hospital staff, a note on a patient’s chart and a sign on their bed indicating hearing impairment could go a long way. Simply ensuring that doctors and staff are aware of hearing loss can help guard against miscommunication. Unfortunately, some patients pretend to hear when they actually can’t. It can be hard to identify these patients as having hearing loss, which can tragically result in insufficient treatment. While the stigma associated with hearing loss is definitely on the decline, it can still be a major impediment to some patients receiving the care they need while hospitalized. We all need to understand that hearing loss is not a scarlet letter, but a fact of life for most of us as we age. About one-third of Americans between age 65–74 have hearing loss, and two-thirds of those over 75 have it. Nearly 100% of centenarians have hearing loss, suggesting we’ll all have hearing loss if we live long enough. If you have hearing loss, addressing it directly is the best way to ensure that you have not only the care you need should you need to enter the hospital, but that you can feel as free and confident as you did before hearing loss became an issue.Hearing Aids Can Help
Hearing aids are not only the best existing treatment for hearing loss—they’re better than ever. For those who have access to them, hearing aids are available in a variety of types to suit every lifestyle. Everyone has different priorities with their hearing, so talking to your hearing care professional can go a long way toward ensuring that you get the hearing aids that will work best for you. Hearing aids today connect to smartphones and other devices, automatically reduce background noise, assist with spatial awareness, and generally do a better job than ever before at improving the lives of those with hearing issues. If you or a loved one may have hearing loss, make an appointment for a hearing test today and find out if hearing aids are right for you. Join the millions of people who are living life to the fullest with the help of a good set of hearing aids!
Facts & Fictions about Hearing Loss
For most of history, hearing loss came with a stigma. Hearing loss was associated with getting old, and hearing aids were crude devices that old people used to try to hear what little they could pick up. Nowadays, stars and important people like Bill Clinton, Herbie Hancock, Rob Lowe and Jodie Foster sport their state-of-the-art hearing aids at public events and talk openly about dealing with hearing loss. The stigma has more or less disappeared, and the rise of “hearables” has put what are effectively assistive listening devices in the ears of just about everyone. Far from indicating enfeeblement, hearing aids keep us in the conversation and allow us to live much the same as we did before hearing loss became an issue. Today, let’s debunk a few of the common myths about hearing loss.Hearing Loss Only Affects Old People
Actually, of the 48 million Americans affected by hearing loss, 40% are younger than 60. While hearing loss does tend to come on more steadily with age, many of the people dealing with it are younger than you would think.I Shouldn’t Have Gone to Those Rock Concerts
Rock concerts definitely don’t improve hearing, but there are lots of factors that go into why a person develops hearing loss. Genes, the normal aging process, ototoxic medications and herbs, smoking, diabetes, and even a typical American diet can contribute to hearing loss. Researchers at the Stanford Initiative to Cure Hearing Loss (SICHL) say that even noise-induced hearing loss, the kind from those rock concerts, has a genetic element to how much it affects a person’s hearing ability. And a study at Brigham and Women’s Hospital found that those who kept to an anti-inflammatory diet—such as the Alternate Mediterranean Diet (AMED) or Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH)—had a significantly reduced risk of hearing loss over a four-year period than those who ate other fares. If you enjoy music, you should go for it! But make sure to protect your ears with a good set of earplugs that can handle the decibel level of the concerts you’re attending!I Could Understand Everyone If They’d Just Talk Louder
It’s easy to imagine that this is the case, but it’s probably not true. The louder people talk, the more they’re likely to distort the mechanical path that sound takes on its way to your ears, which will end up distorting what they’re saying anyway. Modern hearing aids are excellent at targeting just the frequencies you need to get a boost at, while minimizing background noise and emphasizing speech. Fitment is usually an ongoing process, but it’s likely that you’ll arrive at a program that works for you and actually makes speech more intelligible if you keep working with your hearing care provider.I Know I Have Hearing Loss, But It’s Not That Bad Yet
Even mild hearing loss is known to cause problems in a person’s lifestyle, relationships, and memory retention. Additionally, changes start to take place in the brain that will make it more difficult to adjust to hearing aids later on. It’s common for people to actually “forget” how to hear speech, which is why many hearing care providers offer training courses for those new to hearing aids. Don’t worry: if you’ve been needing hearing aids for some time, you can still “relearn” to hear speech, but it’s easier to adjust to hearing aids if you never forgot in the first place! The best time to get hearing aids is when a hearing care professional recommends them. If you’re noticing any hearing trouble, make an appointment for a hearing test and find out if you’re a good candidate for hearing aids.Hearing Aids Don’t Make a Big Difference
On the contrary! 95% of people who get hearing aids say they’re satisfied with them, when asked after one year. Studies have found that those who get hearing aids report improvement in social relationships and at work, and even make more money than those with untreated hearing loss. People with hearing aids tend to feel better about themselves and more confident than those who don’t treat their hearing loss, and they even report a greater sense of optimism about their lives and the world in general. Hearing aids make a whole world of difference! If you or a loved one might be in need of hearing aids, make an appointment for a hearing test today and find out what they can do for you!- 1
- 2