Hearing-Safe Smoke Alarms for Tinnitus — LED Strobe Smoke Alarms?

[Marcuso22]

The smoke alarm detector went off at my Mom's place a couple weeks ago & I panicked. I ended up going onto a chair to press the reset button in hopes of shutting it off. As I reached forward with my left arm, the damn alarm sounded and hit my left ear like a gunshot. Now my left ear is even louder at times, especially at night, than what was my worse ear, my right ear. It has affected my sleep & has undone all the progress I made during the past 2 and 1/2 years habituating to reactive tinnitus & hyperacusis.

It's high time these alarm manufacturers & distributors start placing warning signs on their products & apartment residential managers get educated about the dangers of getting tinnitus from these devices & passing on that information to renters! With new code laws & apartment buildings taking extra precautions with placing more alarms in bedroom apartments & other places throughout one's apartment, people will be at more risk of getting tinnitus & suffer from some loss of hearing. Things have gotten out of hand with all these alarms everywhere we look. The same issue with car alarms going off when you least expect it in parking lots.

 

[Mikr]

I first got tinnitus in 2012, but over the years it basically went away. I am not saying I habituated to it, but after around 2018 it was essentially gone. It would flare up a couple of times a year, then settle again. I was living a normal life.

Last Saturday, eight days ago, my linked smoke alarms went off in the house while I was cooking. Normally I hush them, but more than one was triggering, so I panicked and ran around opening all the windows. I eventually pulled them from the ceiling and removed the batteries. I did all this without protection, as I was not thinking clearly in that moment.

I had recently bought new Kidde smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, and they seemed much louder than my old ones. They are listed as 85 decibels at 10 feet, and sound levels increase by about 6 decibels every time you halve the distance. At around 1.25 feet, that would be about 103 decibels. I was that close for several minutes while trying to disable them.

Since then, my tinnitus has returned full time. After being gone for most of seven years, it is distressing, and I have forgotten what it is like to cope with it.

Smoke alarms can be dangerous.