How to treat hearing loss with age?

From the 40 years All human beings begin to lose hearing, initially due to the highest frequencies. “This hearing loss is called presbycusis and it begins earlier in people subjected to high levels of noise for work or leisure reasons,” explains the Dr. Carlos Ruiz Escuderohead of the Otorhinolaryngology Service at the Quirónsalud Madrid University Hospital and Olympia Pozuelo Medical Center. “We are now seeing earlier hearing loss in young people due to inappropriate use of headphones.”

There are two main types of hearing loss: the neurosensory ones that occur when the transmission of sound vibration into a nervous signal fails, and the conductive ones They are those that affect the transmission mechanism of the sound wave.

Presbycusis is normally caused by the involvement of the hair cells in the inner ear that are responsible for transmitting the sound wave. Other causes of hearing loss are driving interruptions of the mechanical wave, which can range from a plug of earwax to involvement of the ear ossicles due to repeated otitis, or tympanic perforations, which can be caused by trauma or infection.

He Dr. Escudero is very clear explaining the preventive measures: “There is the rule of 60-60which is not to use headphones for more than 60% volume in more than 60 minutes a day. In the workplace, it is key to use hearing protection, which should be extended to other recreational activities such as hunting. In addition, it is very important to maintain periodic check-ups to verify hearing level.”

Turning up the volume of the television and problems following conversations in noisy environments are two signs that should put the patient on guard: “It is common for them to report that in restaurants or in noisy places they do hear the conversations but that they cannot understand what is being said,” explains the Dr. Ruiz Escuderowhich recommends in these cases to perform tonal audiometry on the patient in which he or she is exposed to isolated tones in frequency ranges between 250 and 8,000 hertz, which results in an audiogram that makes it easier to know if there is hearing loss or not.”

The patient is offered a treatment depending on the cause of hearing loss: “In the case of neurosensory losses, the most common treatment is hearing aids, which are also very useful in conductive losses. Surgical treatment is an alternative in cases of middle ear problems, for example, in the eardrum or ossicles.”

Another way in patients with driving problems is the use of bone conduction implants that require surgical intervention, as do cochlear implants that are used in sensorineural losses, usually in children born with severe hearing loss.

Hearing recovery is not only the responsibility of the otorhinolaryngologist, they also have a very important role the audiologist, the audiologist and the speech therapist. The audiologist is the specialist in audiological tests for a correct diagnosis and identification of hearing loss; The hearing care professional is the person in charge of adapting hearing prostheses to patients and the speech therapist works, especially in children, on the adaptation of the hearing aid and on language rehabilitation in children with cochlear implants.