Your Body’s Capacity to Recover
The human body typically can heal scratches, cuts, and broken bones, even though some injuries take longer than others. But when it comes to fixing the tiny little hairs in your ear, you’re out of luck. At least, so far. Although scientists are working on it, humans don’t repair the cilia in their ears like animals can. That means you may have permanent hearing loss if you injure the hearing nerve or those little hairs.
When Is Loss of Hearing Irreversible?
The first question you think of when you find out you have hearing loss is, will I get it back? And the answer is, it depends. Fundamentally, there are two kinds of hearing loss:
- Hearing loss caused by damage: But there’s another, more widespread kind of hearing loss that accounts for nearly 90 percent of hearing loss. This sort of hearing loss, which is usually permanent, is known as sensorineural hearing loss. This is how it works: When hit by moving air (sound waves), tiny little hairs in your ears vibrate. These vibrations are then changed, by your brain, into signals that you hear as sound. But loud noises can cause damage to the hairs and, over time, permanently diminish your hearing. Sensorineural hearing loss can also be caused by injury to the nerve or to the inner ear. A cochlear implant may help restore hearing in some cases of hearing loss, specifically extreme cases.
- Hearing loss caused by a blockage: When there’s something obstructing your ear canal, you can have all the symptoms of hearing loss. Debris, earwax, and tumors are just a few of the things that can cause an obstruction. The good news is that after the obstruction is cleared your hearing usually goes back to normal.
Whether hearing aids will help restore your hearing can only be determined by getting a hearing exam.
Treatment of Hearing Loss
So presently there’s no cure for sensorineural hearing loss. But that’s doesn’t mean you can’t get treatment for your loss of hearing. The following are some ways that getting the appropriate treatment can help you:
- Cope successfully with any of the symptoms of hearing loss you might be suffering from.
- Protect and preserve the hearing you still have.
- Make sure your overall quality of life is unaffected or remains high.
- Stay involved socially, keeping isolation away.
- Prevent cognitive decline.
Depending on how serious your loss of hearing is, this treatment can have many kinds. One of the most basic treatments is also one of the most common: hearing aids.
Why Are Hearing Aids an effective Treatment for Hearing Loss?
Hearing aids help the ear with hearing loss to hear sounds and perform to the best of their ability. When your hearing is hindered, the brain struggles to hear, which can exhaust you. As scientist gain more knowledge, they have identified an increased danger of cognitive decline with a persistent lack of cognitive input. By allowing your ears to hear again, hearing aids assist the restoration of mental function. as a matter of fact, it has been shown that using hearing aids can slow cognitive decline by as much as 75%. Background sound can also be tuned out by modern hearing aids letting you focus on what you want to hear.
The Best Defense Is Prevention
Hopefully, if you take one thing away from this information, it this: you can’t depend on recovering from hearing loss, so instead you should focus on safeguarding the hearing you have. Certainly, you can have any obstruction in your ear removed. But many loud noises are harmful even though you may not think they are very loud. That’s why it’s not a bad idea to take the time to safeguard your ears. The better you protect your hearing now, the more treatment options you’ll have when and if you are eventually diagnosed with loss of hearing. Recovery won’t likely be a possibility but treatment can help you keep living a great, full life. Make an appointment with a hearing care expert to find out what your best choice is.
