Turning up the volume doesn’t always solve hearing loss issues. Here’s something to consider: Many people are able to hear very soft sounds, but can’t hear conversations. That’s because hearing loss is often uneven. Certain frequencies are muted while you can hear others without any problem.
Hearing Loss Comes in Numerous Types
- Conductive hearing loss is caused by a mechanical problem in the ear. It might be because of too much buildup of earwax or due to an ear infection or a congenital structural issue. In most circumstances, hearing specialists can treat the underlying condition to enhance your hearing, and if required, recommend hearing aids to fill in for any remaining hearing loss.
- Sensorineural hearing loss is more common and caused by problems with the fragile hairs, or cilia, in the inner ear. When sound is sensed, it vibrates these hairs which send chemical messages to the auditory nerve to be passed to the brain for interpretation. When these little hairs in your inner ear are damaged or killed, they don’t regenerate. This is why the natural aging process is frequently the cause of sensorineural hearing loss. Over the course of our lives, sensorineural hearing loss develops because we expose ourselves to loud noise, have underlying health problems, and take certain medications.
Symptoms of Sensorineural Hearing Loss
You may hear a little better if people talk louder to you, but it isn’t going to completely address your hearing loss problems. Individuals who have sensorineural hearing loss have trouble hearing specific sounds, including consonants in speech. Even though people around them are speaking clearly, someone with this condition might think that people are mumbling.
The frequency of consonant sounds make them difficult to hear for someone experiencing hearing loss. Pitch is measured in hertz (Hz), and many consonants register in our ears at a higher pitch than other sounds. Depending on the voice of the person speaking, a short “o”, for instance, will register between 250 and 1,000 hertz. But consonants like “f” or “s” will be anywhere from 1,500 to 6,000 hertz. People with sensorineural hearing loss have a hard time processing these higher-pitched sounds due to the damage to their inner ears.
This is why just speaking louder doesn’t always help. It won’t help much when someone speaks louder if you don’t understand some of the letters in a word like “shift”.
How Can Hearing Aids Help?
Hearing Aids go inside your ears helping sound reach your auditory system more directly and eliminating some of the outside sound you would normally hear. Also, the frequencies you can’t hear are amplified and mixed with the sounds you are able to hear in a balanced way. In this way, you get more clarity. Modern hearing aids also make it easier to hear speech by blocking some of the unwanted background noise.