It has now been 13 years since my vestibular neurectomy, and it ended up being the best decision I ever made for my Ménière’s. I’m back to a somewhat normal life, although I’ve lost about 80 percent of the hearing in my right ear and have high pitched tinnitus in the same ear 24/7. 

When I was obtaining my doctorate in audiology, I started noticing some telltale signs of hearing loss when talking to my grandmother.

We can now treat otoferlin-related hearing loss. In the next 10 years, we will continue to reach more groups with specific causes of hearing loss—momentum that will help accelerate the process for everyone.

My firsthand experience with hearing, speech, and language development challenges, both personally and as a parent, helped shape my writing.

Our information is based on evidence-based research studies and scholarly articles that support the adverse effects of both intense and chronic high and low frequency noises on our hearing. 

There has been a lot of news lately—in the hearing health space—that we want to highlight, from dementia research to ways to alleviate motion sickness and improve speech comprehension.

The brain may help regulate the ear’s sensitivity to sound and compensate for hearing loss by sending signals to the cochlea, a structure in the inner ear. This discovery could pave the way for new treatments for challenging hearing disorders such as hyperacusis and tinnitus.

As a clinician and university professor, I’ve worked with hundreds of people who hesitated to seek help—not because they couldn’t afford it, or didn’t have access to care, but because doing so meant admitting something they weren’t ready to accept: that something fundamental had changed.

This indicates an extended timeline of auditory development in children, which has exciting scientific and clinical implications.

These findings provide essential insights into hearing loss, related perceptions, and strategies to enhance awareness and promote conversations about hearing health.