Hearing Health Blog
Getting the diagnosis at age 17 made me feel like I couldn't really be a teenager and enjoy my time as a teen. Over time, I accepted it as a part of my life but also learned how to change my lifestyle to be able to live the life I want to live.
Despite lacking evidence for sympathetic overactivation in Ménière's disease, surgeons eagerly adopted sympathectomies, and later betahistine, and the latter is still commonly used outside the U.S. as treatment.
Have you ever felt dizzy, nauseous, or unsteady on your feet after leaving a loud concert? That could be the balance organ inside your inner ear reacting to the loud sounds.
The sensory organs that allow us to walk, dance, and turn our heads without dizziness or loss of balance contain specialized synapses that process signals faster than any other in the human body.
Isaiah, age 15, expresses his experience of tinnitus as that of an alien orchestra performing in his ear. I use the musical performance theme and musical references throughout my graphic novel.
About 18 years ago, I woke up one morning with extreme vertigo, or dizziness, and then later noticed that my hearing was decreasing in both ears. I also had some shooting pain in my cheeks/facial nerves. A couple of days later, I realized I had tinnitus (ringing in the ears), and it was so loud early on—or at least so new to me—that it would wake me up and keep me up at night.
As a veteran entertainment industry executive, I am acutely aware of the power that film and television have to enlighten, so I decided to develop “Unheard: The Ears of Ménière’s,” a documentary that will shine a light on this debilitating disease which has remained unheard for far too long.
The audiologist listened to my shock and confusion, but confirmed that my test printout showed severe hearing loss. She did one other brief test, which showed 95 percent word recognition. I always hear conversations, so how could I have all this hearing loss?
During my third year at University of Michigan, where I was studying biochemistry and French, I became aware of an unfamiliar, jarring sensation—extreme dizziness. If I closed my eyes for just a little bit, I’d feel my surroundings spinning. It was around the same time I recognized my difficulties hearing in large lecture halls.
Since it was first discovered, Ménière’s disease has been a disorder managed primarily by otolaryngologists. As a result, surgical treatments have accompanied attempts at medical management. Inspired by patients' sensations of ear fullness and later by the histologic findings of hydrops, surgeons began manipulating the membranous labyrinth to relieve episodes of vertigo while attempting to preserve hearing.
