Hearing plays a major role in the quality of life. As International Listening Awareness Month comes around this March, it is important to assess your hearing and remember the role it plays in your health and happiness. The ability to hear the sounds and the people around us enriches our lives and allows us to socialize, communicate, be intimate, work, interact, relax, and have fun. Not only does it mentally keep us healthier, but it also keeps us safe because we can hear noises, warnings, or others in distress. In order to fully participate in daily life as we once knew it, we must be able to hear. As we communicate, we learn large quantities of information through our hearing. Once our hearing declines, it is up to you to do something about it and early detection tends to be the key.
When hearing declines, quality of life seems to as well. When we have problems with our listening, it often leads to feelings of depression or isolation. We don’t want to be around others in fear that we will be singled out or our poor hearing pointed out. It can be embarrassing to deal with, but knowing that you are not alone can help, too. A 2011 study showed that that one-fifth of all Americans age 12 and older experience hearing loss so severe that it can make communication difficult. With 35 million Americans already suffering from some type of hearing loss, number of people with hearing loss in the United States is steadily increasing, according to several studies.
In order to improve your listening and your life, it is important to listen to the advice of audiologists who offer services like hearing aids or ear wax removal which can benefit the patient. Our hearing doctors communicate with the patient during the assessment process as well as the treatment process to ensure that their quality of hearing helps to improve the quality of their life at the same time. Today, hearing aids come in many shapes and sizes. Manufacturers have come a long way developing hearing aids that are smaller in size and able to provide even greater satisfaction to the patient in noisy situations.
Hearing loss can occur for a number of reasons and should be treated early. Assessing your own hearing is crucial. Although it may seem like a scary or intimidating call to make, there are usually solutions for some types of hearing problems. Safety is a major concern as mentioned above. We need to be able to hear when we are walking down busy roads, to hear traffic signals or horns, listen for others yelling for help, and much more. When hearing declines, people can have feelings of helplessness. Improving the quality of life and bringing attention to the role hearing and listening play are the purposes of International Listening Awareness Month. Contact us today with concerns you may have and put some attention on your listening needs for once. Your quality of life doesn’t have to decline just because your hearing has.