Questions Involving Acoustic Trauma and Hearing Loss

Today, an ENT visit helped assure I am not suffering from SSHL as I was previously paranoid of. I managed to get a copy of my audiogram results from August, which show my left ear hearing loss is actually borderline normal/mild, with someone frequencies being normal while others are more mild.

Since then I have to wonder whether this has held up for the most part or not. My biggest concern has been the few number of times in which I was very briefly (a few seconds) exposed to a very loud sound that could constitute hearing loss.

One particular incident from 5-7 weeks ago involved use of my car stereo. Basically I was switching back and forth between music (which volume level was 9-12) and pure tone tinnitus masking videos on YouTube (volume level 4-6). After pausing my music to switch to the masking, I forgot to lower the volume, so the first and loudest tone of the cluster was blasted into my ears as double the intensity it should have been for 2-4 seconds. I jumped and quickly lowered the volume. Still, the shock makes me wonder if it caused further hearing loss in my left ear since it got the loudest amount of it.

So I am wondering how likely a situation like that is to worsen my condition. I did not have a perceived spike following the incident, but am worried it made my hearing loss completely mild or even moderate.

 

Hearing tests can differ each time you have one.
This can be due to a cold,
Mucous in tubes and how loud your tinnitus is during the test and age related as getting older.
Try relax and stop looking dehind and its the here and now what matters and learning cope with your sound.
Love glynis

 

Audiometry represents a test done under ideal conditions and does not accurately assess the state of the inner ear (i.e. just because a person's hearing is "normal" does not mean they do not have cochlear deficits). Patient history or speech-in-noise testing are more reliable ways to ascertain if damage has been done or not. Those who have a history of noise exposure are prone to accelerated ageing of the inner ear. This can be seen via literature such as that published by Prof. Liberman or Prof. Kujawa. A paper on starter pistols also indicated that young people should be better protected than adults at sporting events, not because their ears are less fragile, but because being young, a person has more years ahead of them (and hence accelerated ageing of the cochlea is not exactly the best way to proceed).

 

My speech recognition was 100%.

 

And speech-in-noise testing...?

 

That's exactly what I just described.

 

Speech recognition can be done with or without background noise.

 

It was done with both. It was a hearing test. Anything else you'd like to nitpick before I "ignore" you?

 

As I said to you in a previous post @Gl0w0ut I don't believe your hearing loss is anything significant. I advise you to follow my suggestion. That is to start taking a good quality Ginkgo Biloba preverably in tincture form and don't stop taking it. It will help improve your hearing and could help your tinnitus. It is stress and anxiety caused by worries that is mostly causing your problem and headphone use. Your condtion will improve with time it's not a quick fix. Be patient and you will improve.

Michael

 

Actually yes: did you remember to pay your ATA membership...?

 

No. I prefer to funnel money to useful organizations that looks to solve the problem rather than mask it or "retrain" it.

 

Have you donated any money to research? I’m always curious how many people with tinnitus give to the cause.

Anyway, I think you need to try and stop over analysing everything because that seems to be one of your biggest issues.

 

what caused your T?

 

Wonderful. So, do I. Which organization did you settle on then?