Hearing Health Blog Archive
In addition to conducting research, I realized that prevention is just as important, or even more important than treatment. Noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) is becoming increasingly prevalent among Gen Z—my peers—due to increased access to personal listening devices and loud entertainment events.
Auracast promises something long imagined but never fully realized: a standardized, open broadcast that allows audience members to receive high-quality audio directly in their own hearing aids, earbuds, or smartphones. This happens without venue-specific hardware, without checkout counters, and without the stigma or inconvenience of borrowed devices.
The internship last summer provided my first real chance to step into hearing science and learn the experimental side of speech perception under the tutelage of a senior researcher.
Our new public service announcement “Let’s Listen Smart” recognizes that life is loud—and it’s also fun. And the last thing we want to do is stop having fun! We just need to listen responsibly.
Hearing contributes directly to independence, confidence, and how actively people participate in daily routines, and regular hearing checks deserve the same kind of attention people already give to routine doctor or dental visits.
We are proud that Hearing Health Foundation-funded scientists are always well represented at Association for Research in Otolaryngology MidWinter Meeting.
For individuals with long-term hearing loss or severely degraded auditory input, the lack of reliable auditory feedback represents a challenge many orders of magnitude greater than the temporary masking used in this study.
It bears repeating: What improves access for a group with a specific disability invariably also helps the greater population.
Because noise-canceling earbuds are so comfortable and block everything out, people wear them for three, four, five hours straight without realizing the cumulative effect on their ears.
I made one hat to solve problems, never imagining how many other adults and children would relate. It’s an honor to be able to give something back to the cochlear implant community that understands this journey so well.
These findings suggest that the ability to integrate what is seen with what is heard becomes increasingly important with age, especially for cochlear implant users.
Tinnitus Quest’s Tinnitus Hackathon prioritized active problem-solving, cross-disciplinary debate, and the development of a shared research agenda.
As the first known Black author to publish a 10-book children’s series centered on deaf, hard of hearing, and disabled heroes, I’ve created what I once longed for: stories where children see themselves as powerful.
Social platforms have become spaces to compare symptoms, crowdsource explanations, and seek community. For tinnitus, that openness has helped many people feel less alone. Unfortunately, it has also created space for confusion, misinformation, and discouraging myths that can delay effective care.
Often these surprising sources of loud sounds come about from a misguided belief that loud means fun—the louder it is, the more festive. The good news? Because the decibel scale is logarithmic, turning it down even a little can help save our hearing a lot.
When thinking about exposure to loud sounds, it is important to take a life-course perspective. That is, the health behaviors developed in childhood and adolescence can shape habits into adulthood.
I know the only way I could hear it is if we all stopped playing and moved up to the net every time someone has something to say.
The team’s analysis uncovered a surprising diversity of supporting cells, the “non-sensory cellular guardians” that surround and protect the sensory hair cells and may facilitate their regeneration
It seems paradoxical that a hearing condition intended to work against me could give me the power to truly understand music, but this battle has taught me more about positivity and hope than any motivational speech could.
Before the HRP, there was no mechanism for data sharing and collaboration, no way to assess gene expression rigorously or to identify relevant patterns, and no examples of new hair cells generated in a post-hearing mammalian cochlea.
Despite decades of research showing the profound impact of hearing health on overall quality of life, most people won't consider their auditory system until problems become undeniable.
The squirrels’ improved ability to hear low frequency sounds is likely a sensory adaptation to life at high elevations, where weather and thin air can reduce how well sound travels. The study highlights how hearing and behavior can evolve together to help animals survive in challenging acoustic environments.
When wearing earplugs earns a reprimand from a master teacher, two high school classical musicians decide it’s time to change the conversation about the risk of hearing loss among their peers.
A practical reference, not a lecture, from a music industry professional on how to protect our first instrument: our hearing.
The next step in this field is the use of powerful modern sequencing technology in order to map gene activity and gene regulation during hair cell regeneration in fish and birds as well as in mammalian balance organs.
We found that the aging brain tries to amplify degraded input from the auditory nerve and that amplified responses are associated with poorer brain structure and trouble with speech understanding.
Today, I wear my “HARD OF HEARING” hoodie proudly because I’m no longer hiding from my hearing loss.