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10 Ways to Stop Your Hearing Loss from Getting Worse
November 15, 2021

10 Ways to Stop Your Hearing Loss from Getting Worse

Two people are sitting on a park bench talking to each other

You’re not alone if you’re having issues with hearing loss. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has identified hearing loss as the third most common chronic health problem in the country.

For me, hearing loss is much more than a matter of statistics. As a child, seeing my father’s struggles with hearing loss inspired me to become an audiologist. I wanted to help people with hearing loss have full lives with their family and friends. That’s why sharing strategies to stop hearing loss from getting worse is a critical part of our work at Johnson Audiology.

 

Try to Avoid Noisy Places

If possible, it’s best to stay away from loud environments. Since most of us aren’t walking around with sound level meters, we need another way to tell when the noise level is not safe for our ears. One sign the surroundings are too noisy is you have to raise your voice to be heard by someone who is within three feet.

 

Stay Away From Loud Noises

It only takes one exposure to loud noise for your hearing to get worse. For example, being too close to firecrackers or sirens once could damage your hearing. A more common danger is regular or prolonged exposure to moderate noise. These sounds come from everyday items like power tools, gas-powered lawnmowers, factory machinery, and even poorly-designed children’s toys.

Using headphones and earbuds at a high volume also can damage your hearing. We recommend keeping the volume level below 60 percent (just past halfway).

 

Use Hearing Protection

It’s important to wear hearing protection when you have to be around loud noises. Using either earplugs or snug-fitting protective earmuffs is helpful. Wearing protective earmuffs and earplugs together provides greater protection. Earplugs and protective earmuffs are widely available online or over-the-counter from hardware stores and home improvement stores. When hearing protection is necessary at work, federal regulations require your employer to provide it as personal protective equipment.

 

Know the Signs of Hearing Loss

It’s possible to have hearing loss and be unaware of it. You should schedule a hearing assessment in Chattanooga if:

You have difficulty hearing over the phone

People sound muffled in person

You hear ringing or hissing in one or both ears

You have trouble hearing high-pitch sounds like birds or the doorbell

You’re always asking people to repeat themselves, speak louder, or more slowly

 

Take Care of Your Overall Health

Making healthy choices is good for hearing health and your overall health. A healthy diet is associated with a lower risk of hearing loss. Getting enough sleep, lowering stress, and staying physically active is good for your ears and the rest of your body. In contrast, smoking increases your risk of many health problems, including hearing loss.


Look Into Your Family History

Learning your family history can reveal health problems that can have an impact on your hearing. Of course, you want to find out if there’s a history of hearing issues. It’s also a good idea to learn if any chronic health problems like diabetes run in your family. People with certain chronic illnesses, such as high blood pressure , have higher rates of hearing loss than the general population. When you’re aware of your risk for chronic health problems, you can work with your primary care physician to lower your risk.

 

Get Regular Hearing Exams

Annual hearing tests are essential for anyone who has hearing loss. Each year your audiologist will compare the result of that year’s exam to your previous tests. Regular examinations allow your hearing specialist to catch problems early.

 

Listen to Your Loved Ones

Your friends and family may realize you’re having more trouble with your hearing before you do. Your loved ones may say you’re always asking them to speak more clearly or slowly. They may have noticed that you tend to switch ears on the telephone. Your family may complain you’re turning the volume too loud on the television. When your loved ones suggest you see a hearing specialist, it’s time to make an appointment.

 

Take Steps to Prevent Head Injuries

An appropriate helmet is necessary when you’re playing contact sports like football or rugby. Your employer should provide a hard hat if your job puts you at higher risk for a head injury; if they don’t, we encourage you to invest in one.

 

Make the Most of Your Hearing

If your hearing loss has had an impact on your lifestyle, hearing aids may be helpful. We can adjust them to meet your specific needs. However, they’re only effective when you use them. If you’re concerned about how they look, there’s no need to worry. Due to the wide variety of styles available, many hearing aids are barely visible.

If you’re struggling with hearing loss, scheduling your hearing assessment is a great way to start protecting your hearing. Contact us today at Johnson Audiology to make an appointment.


March 6, 2025
Chipper Gocke, 28, has had many poignant moments in the last six weeks since his cochlear implant surgery. “A workmate commented recently that my speaking voice is the appropriate volume now. Not being able to hear myself, I probably often talked too loud before. It seems like a small thing, but it is a way to be more normalized in my professional and other settings.” His mother, Amy Gocke, also has noticed the changes. “Chipper has never called me on the phone before. With his profound lifelong hearing loss and even using powerful hearing aids, he simply couldn’t communicate by phone. Now I look forward to his calls every day after he gets off work.” These daily experiences that people often take for granted—communicating with a workmate or calling a family member to say hello—are now possible for Chipper because of his cochlear implant. Hearing loss has been a part of Chipper’s life since he was a small child. Chipper’s father, Ted Gocke, relates, “From the time he was 18 months old, Chipper had ear infections that had us in and out of the hospital. That led to tubes in his ears and the diagnosis that he had a significant hearing loss.” As a youngster, Chipper received early intervention services before he even reached school age. He also got established with local audiologist, Darnell Scafe, and they reconnected recently when Chipper sought out Darnell for hearing health care services as an adult. Darnell, who joined the Johnson Audiology team in 2018, says, “I remember Chipper as a sweet little boy who didn’t let his hearing loss slow him down. It’s wonderful to get to know the fine, capable young man he has grown into.” Last year, Darnell encouraged Chipper to consider a cochlear implant, and she referred him to Johnson Audiology’s Cochlear Implant Program Director, Dr. Hannah Dearth. Dr. Dearth then was able to complete cochlear implant candidacy testing. In November of last year, Chipper’s surgery was performed at Murfreesboro Medical Clinic (MMC) in Middle Tennessee by an otolaryngologist (ENT). A native of Chattanooga, Chipper traveled for the initial surgery since there is not currently an ENT in Chattanooga who performs CI surgeries. However, Chipper then had his cochlear implant activated at Johnson Audiology (JA) by Dr. Dearth in early January. Also, there to celebrate activation day was Darnell. “It felt like a full circle moment when Dr. Dearth activated Chipper’s cochlear implant, and he began to have those first sound perceptions.” Dr. Dearth explains, “People often wonder how a hearing aid and a cochlear implant are different. Cochlear implants are designed for patients whose hearing aids are no longer assisting them in understanding in both quiet and noisy environments. A hearing aid is designed to provide amplification for speech sounds that are unintelligible without said amplification. Cochlear implants are a surgical option for those who are no longer able to achieve meaningful understanding with a traditional hearing aid. Hearing aids rely on the ear’s natural pathway for hearing to accomplish this and so may not work well for someone with severe damage to the inner ear. A cochlear implant, on the other hand, bypasses the damaged parts of the ear by stimulating the auditory nerve directly with a mild electrical current that sends the sound signal to the brain.” Chipper is committed to his own success with his cochlear implant and in addition to listening to the speech of those around him, he is also tuning in to podcasts and audiobooks that give him even more speech exposure. Dr. Dearth says that is a huge factor in any patient’s ability to thrive with the device. “The patients who are committed to the aural rehabilitation as prescribed experience faster progress and higher success rates long term.” Chipper will continue regular follow-up appointments for the rest of his life to maintain successful progress with his CI. He gets emotional talking about the social isolation that can be a common side effect of profound hearing loss and, also, mentions the spatial awareness that better hearing offers. “Being able to pinpoint sound and localize stimuli from both sides of the head has positive effects for living a safe life,” Dr. Dearth says. Dr. Megan Johnson, audiologist, founder, and owner of JA, says, “Johnson Audiology has provided support for cochlear implant patients since 2017 with care offered through the practice’s location on Lee Highway in the East Brainerd area. After implantation, every other part of a CI patient’s hearing journey can be accomplished at Johnson Audiology—from initial activation to routine mapping.”  Chipper and his parents encourage people to explore the possibility of cochlear implants since it can make such a difference in a person’s daily life and function. Johnson Audiology is accepting new patients who currently wear hearing aids but would like to pursue cochlear implant candidacy as well as those who already have a cochlear implant. Call Johnson Audiology at 423.556.7185 or visit www.johnsonaudiology.com/schedule for more information or to schedule an appointment.
By Jan Hollingsworth May 16, 2024
Research reveals that hearing loss actually rewires your neural pathways Your Amazing Brain Your brain is an amazing organ! This wrinkly, reddish-pink mass weighs about the same as your two-slice toaster, tipping the scales at about three pounds. Acting as a master control center, your brain enables every thought, breath, eye blink, heartbeat, movement—everything—that happens in your body. Rivaling the world’s most powerful supercomputer, your brain can download, process, and react in milliseconds to the tidal wave of information coming from your eyes, skin, nose, tongue, and ears. Neuroplasticity and Your Sense of Hearing Researchers have discovered that the human nervous system—made up of the brain, spinal cord, and a complex network of nerves—has incredible capacity to modify itself, both in function and physical structure. This is called neural plasticity . Dr. Megan Johnson, audiologist and owner of Johnson Audiology explains, “Neural plasticity is going gangbusters in a child’s brain as the child develops and matures into adulthood. Based on years of brain research, we also know that the adult brain is far from being fixed. It, too, changes and adapts when you learn new information or skills or as a response to stress, hormonal fluctuations, drug interactions, injury, and much more.” Dr. Johnson also relates that “your brain displays neuroplasticity when you experience hearing loss.” By measuring brain waves using an electroencephalograph, or EEG, scientists have studied how the brain of a person with hearing loss functions compared to a person with normal hearing. The results are both fascinating and sobering as studies reveal that, in those with hearing loss, the portion of the brain devoted to hearing becomes reorganized. This can be true even with early-stage, mild hearing loss, and the process happens quickly, often in months rather than years. The Hearing Center of Your Brain and Beyond What is actually happening when this takes place? Your brain has a right and a left hemisphere and six major lobes. Think of your frontal lobe as your brain’s boss, where executive functions like decision making, emotion and impulse control, and planning occur. Your temporal lobe, which contains the auditory cortex, is doing the heavy lifting when it comes to interpreting sounds and assigning those sounds meaning. The temporal lobe processes speech and language, and it is where initial learning of new information takes place, which is the first step for logging that information into memory. Dr. Johnson goes on to relate, “When the delicate infrastructure of your ear has become damaged through noise exposure, infection, etc. leading to hearing loss, your auditory cortex cries out to your frontal lobe, saying ‘Help! Help! I’m not receiving any sound to process, so I feel lost.’ The frontal lobe ‘boss’ jumps to attention, and your occipital lobe, responsible for processing vision and touch, takes over the areas in which hearing is normally processed. In other words, your other senses seek to compensate for the deficit due to the loss of your sense of hearing.” Amazing, right? So, where’s the rub? Picture a car assembly line; each worker has an assigned task. One day, the worker who installs the windshields is absent, and the worker who attaches the rearview mirrors is assigned double duty, and a duty that was not part of job training. It is easy to see how the worker left juggling both jobs is compromised, and a car might slip through minus a rear view mirror. Similarly, the areas of your brain that are being taxed to make up for a lack of hearing are overloaded and less able to do their assigned responsibilities. “This explains why so many of my patients with hearing loss relate feeling exhausted and frustrated after a big family gathering—where multiple talkers and sounds must be interpreted—rather than happy and invigorated by the experience. We call this listening fatigue ,” states Dr. Johnson. Additionally, when left untreated long enough, researchers point to the brain’s reorganization due to hearing loss as a significant correlation with dementia. Hearing Technology and Your Brain “But here's the great news!” Dr. Johnson says. When a person is fit with hearing aids or a cochlear implant and sound is restored, the brain has the ability to adjust back—partially or completely—to proper function. How swiftly that happens often depends on how long the hearing loss went untreated and is why she encourages patients to treat hearing loss sooner rather than later. “Here is what I tell patients who are downplaying the importance of hearing: If you won’t treat your hearing loss for the sake of your ears, do it for your brain!”
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