How to treat hearing loss

At the present time, there is no medical cure for hearing loss. If you have a hearing loss and wish to improve your hearing, you should use hearing aids or in some cases implants. However, there are many different kinds of implant and hearing aid.

You can look after your hearing by for example avoiding too much noise. It has also been scientifically proven that vitamins can prevent hearing loss. But if you already have a hearing loss, it has unfortunately come to stay. The “cure” for hearing loss is often hearing aids and in some cases implants.

Hearing aids have developed greatly in the last few years. Pretty much all hearing aids are today digital and can be programmed and set very precisely so that they fit the individual’s needs and hearing loss. Some even have programmes which automatically adjust themselves to the situation one finds one’s self in.

Types of hearing aids

There are four types of hearing aid:

BTE (behind the ear) ITE (In the ear) ITC (In the canal) CIC (completely in the canal)

BTE hearing aids sit behind the ear and are the type of hearing aid most of us know. BTE are very common and come as what is called “open fitting”. This means that the ear mould does not fill the entire ear canal, but allows air into the ear, just as with people without hearing aids.

ITE are the largest hearing aids which sit in the ear and they fill most of the entrance to the ear. ITC are smaller. They sit in the ear canal and can almost not be seen. The smallest are CIC which sit all the way inside the ear and are practically invisible.

Implants

Some people need implants instead of hearing aids. But implants are very expensive and require an operation. Therefore, a special medical or clinical reason is needed before you can get an implant.

The most common types of implants are middle ear implants, inner ear implants, bone anchored hearing aids and auditory brainstem implants.

Middle ear implants are implants which sit in the middle ear and transmit sound to the inner ear via a microphone placed behind the ear.

Inner ear implants are implanted in the inner ear and the sound is transported from a microphone behind the ear directly into the inner ear, then to the brain.

A bone anchored hearing aid is an implant attached to the cranium, in which the cranium is used to transport sound in to the inner ear. Bone anchored hearing aids are often used by people who have problems with the transmission of sound in the outer ear.

Auditory brainstem implants are implants in the brain. Sound is captured by the implant and sent directly to the brain without the ear. This type of implant can provide a form of hearing for people who are deaf.

Soren Petersen is the author of this article on Middle Ear Implant. Find more information on Hearing Components here.