You may think hearing loss should be simple to spot, but it’s not as easy to recognize as you may believe.
First, most individuals with hearing loss have trouble only with select sounds and in specified scenarios. Consequently, if you can hear normally on some occasions, you’ll be inclined to blame other factors or other people for the times you do have trouble hearing.
Second, hearing loss comes about slowly through the years, so it’s difficult to notice the slow progression. It’s simpler and easier to blame it on other people for mumbling, or to turn up the TV volume a little louder, than to acknowledge that you may have hearing loss.
As a result, the signs and symptoms can be elusive. You have to know what to watch out for, and while it’s easy to disavow that you have hearing loss, you should be honest with yourself about the warning signs.
Here are the top 10 to look out for. If you detect the presence of any, it may be time to arrange a hearing exam.
- You experience ringing in the ears – this might be a symptom of permanent hearing injury. Hearing aids can not only help you to hear better, but they may also be able to alleviate the ringing in your ears.
- You can’t hear regular household sounds – hearing loss can make it difficult to hear the doorbell, the telephone ringing, or another person shouting your name from another room.
- You have trouble comprehending TV dialogue – speech is normally more challenging to hear than other types of sound. This frequently shows itself as difficulty following movie or television show plots.
- You have your cellphone, TV, or radio at maximum volume – if you can hear the television, phone, or radio better than you can hear personal discussions, check the volume settings on your technology. You could have these devices set at excessive volumes while at the same time believing that everyone else speaks too quietly.
- You request that people repeat themselves regularly – you detect that you say “what?” a lot, or that you need to ask people to repeat themselves when you’re not facing them.
- You commonly misconstrue what people are saying – consonants are higher-pitched, and thus more difficult to hear, than the lower-pitched vowels. Since consonants transmit the majority of the meaning in a sentence, speech comprehension suffers.
- You have difficulty hearing all the words in a conversation – particular sounds and letters are more difficult to hear than others. What this means is you can hear most of the words in a sentence, but that you have to more often than not try to fill in the blanks.
- You have trouble hearing when your back is to the speaker – you may rely on lip reading, body language, and other tips to meaning significantly more than you think. When you’re not looking at the speaker, and can’t use these cues, you may have difficulty comprehending speech.
- You have trouble hearing with a great deal of background noise – as hearing loss gets to be more serious, contesting noise becomes more of a problem. You might be able to hear speech in quiet spaces, but it becomes increasingly difficult to follow conversations in a loud setting like a restaurant.
- People complain that you shout or have the TV volume too loud – people may comment that you have the TV volume too loud or that you have the tendency to yell. It doesn’t appear to be this way to you because you’re compensating for your hearing loss.
Do you notice one or more of the top 10 warning signs of hearing loss? If yes, book your hearing test today, and take the steps to begin living an improved, more productive, and healthier life.