Understanding Hearing Loss
Hearing loss can be confusing, leaving you feeling isolated and disconnected. If you have difficulty hearing the conversation or it seems like everything is muffled, you’re not alone. Approximately 48 million people in the U.S. have some degree of hearing loss. While there isn’t a cure for hearing loss, hearing aids are a great management option to help you hear again.
At Solinsky Hearing Center, our team understands how isolating hearing loss can make you feel. That’s why we provide ongoing care and support to all of our patients. Our goal is to help you reconnect with your loved ones again and regain your independence.
Hearing and Health
Your ears play an important role in more than just your hearing. The body relies on the ears for sounds, balance, and spatial awareness. If you have experienced hearing loss as the result of a head injury, then you may notice balance problems as well. Our sense of balance comes within the cochlea, located in the inner ear, which also homes the hearing nerve. For this reason, you may experience dizziness and hearing loss together.
Other health conditions can also be connected to hearing loss, such as diabetes, heart disease, and high blood pressure. All of these conditions affect blood flow. The tiny blood vessels in the ear are extremely sensitive, and the smallest changes can affect hearing. In fact, individuals with one of these health conditions are more likely to have hearing loss. If you have an underlying health condition, it’s important to visit us for a hearing check and to visit your physician for annual health exams.
Signs of Hearing Loss
For the majority of people, hearing loss occurs slowly, over the course of a couple years. It can be difficult to recognize the signs for this reason. If you have noticed any of the following, it’s time for a hearing evaluation.
- Voices sound muffled
- You can hear but you lack clarity
- It’s hard to follow the conversation when there is more than one speaker
- Women and children’s voices are harder to hear
- It’s difficult to hear when there is background noise (in a restaurant)
- You frequently ask people to repeat themselves
- You have an underlying health condition (heart disease, diabetes, or high blood pressure)
- A friend, family member, or colleague has suggested you have your hearing checked
Tinnitus
Do you hear a ringing in your ears? Tinnitus, often described as hearing a buzzing, ringing, or whistling sound in the ears, is incredibly common. In fact, around 50 million people experience tinnitus to some degree. Tinnitus affects everyone differently. For some, the symptoms may only last a few seconds while others experience it constantly.
While there is no cure for ringing in the ears, our tinnitus specialists in CT can help. If tinnitus is disrupting your quality of life, hearing aids might help you. We offer hearing aids that have a special tinnitus masking feature that can help alleviate the symptoms of tinnitus. A tinnitus test can be performed during your hearing evaluation to determine how you are affected and if it is connected to hearing loss. If you are ready to manage tinnitus, contact us today.