Most estimates put the number of people impacted by tinnitus in the millions or about one out of every seven people. In some countries, the numbers are even higher and that’s pretty startling.
Sometimes tinnitus is goes away on it’s own. But if you’re coping with persistent tinnitus symptoms it becomes imperative to find a treatment as soon as possible. Fortunately, there is a treatment that has proven to be quite effective: hearing aids.
Tinnitus and hearing loss are connected but distinct conditions. you can have hearing loss without tinnitus or tinnitus without hearing loss. But the two conditions occur together frequently enough that hearing aids have become a practical solution, managing hearing loss and stopping tinnitus in one fell swoop.
How Can Tinnitus be Helped by Hearing Aids?
Hearing aids have, according to one survey, been reported to give tinnitus relief to up to 60% of participants. For 22% of those individuals, the relief was significant. In spite of this, hearing aids are actually designed to deal with hearing loss not specifically tinnitus. Association seems to be the principal reason for this benefit. As such, hearing aids appear to be most practical if you have tinnitus and hearing loss.
Here’s how tinnitus symptoms can be decreased with hearing aids:
- External sounds are enhanced: When you experience loss of hearing, the volume of the outside world (or, at least, specific frequencies of the world) can fade away and become more silent. The ringing in your ears, then, is much more obvious. It’s the loudest thing you hear because it is not impacted by your hearing loss. A hearing aid can increase that ambient sound, helping to drown out the ringing or buzzing that was so prominent before. Tinnitus becomes less of a problem as you pay less attention to it.
- It becomes less difficult to have conversations: Contemporary hearing aids are particularly good at identifying human speech and raising the volume of those sounds. So once you’re using your hearing aids on a regular basis, having conversations gets much easier. You will be more engaged with your co-worker’s story about their kids and better able to participate with your spouse about how their day went. When you have a balanced involved social life tinnitus can seem to fade into the background. Socializing also helps decrease stress, which is linked to tinnitus.
- The increased audio stimulation is keeping your brain fit: When you have hearing loss, those regions of your brain charged with interpreting sounds can often suffer from stress, fatigue, or atrophy. Tinnitus symptoms you may be experiencing can be decreased when the brain is in a healthy pliable condition and hearing aids can help keep it that way.
Modern Hearing Aids Come With Many Benefits
Modern hearing aids are smart. To some degree, that’s because they feature the latest technologies and hearing assistance algorithms. But it’s the ability to personalize a hearing aid to the specific user’s requirements that makes modern hearing aids so effective (sometimes, they recalibrate according to the amount of background noise).
Personalizing hearing aids means that the sensitivity and output signals can easily be adjusted to the particular hearing levels you may have. The better your hearings aid works for you, the more likely they are to help you drown out the humming or buzzing from tinnitus.
What is The Best Way to End Tinnitus?
Your degree of hearing loss will dictate what’s right for you. There are still treatment options for your tinnitus even if you don’t have any hearing impairment. Medication, cognitive behavioral therapy, or a custom masking device are some possible options.
However, if you’re one of the many individuals out there who happen to suffer from both hearing impairment and tinnitus, a pair of hearing aids might be able to do the old two-birds-one-stone thing. Stop tinnitus from making your life miserable by managing your hearing loss with a good set of hearing aids.