Photo credit: Maurício Mascaro from Pexels
by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition
This well-written article in Popular Science discusses hidden hearing loss. Hidden hearing loss is caused by damages to the nerve junctions between the cochlear hair cells and the auditory nerves. It’s called “hidden” because the damage isn’t detected by standard pure tone audiometry tests, only by more sophisticated testing. Patients complain that they can’t understand what people are saying in crowded or noisy situations, but the audiologist tells them, “Your hearing is fine. There’s no problem.” For decades, this was known as the “speech in noise” problem.
It turns out that there is a problem, and it’s caused by damage to the nerve junctions, which interferes with processing of the sound by the nervous system.
The problem of understanding speech in noise, which is most likely a manifestation of hidden hearing loss, isn’t rare. Approximately 10-20% of adults appear to have it, and it may even be more common in those of middle-to-older age.
More evidence supporting the need for us to protect our ears from loud noise.
