Articles
-
Hearing loss found in ancient bones
Today, 17th July, marks the beginning of the Council for British Archaeology’s Festival of Archaeology – a two-week long celebration of the fascinating layers of history that lie under our feet. What’s that got to do with hearing, you say? Well, it got us thinking about what life was like for people with a hearing impairment and deafness in previous centuries. What evidence does archaeology give us for lives lived with these challenges in the past? Ancient evidence of hearing loss Human remains dating back thousands of years and found by archaeologists in the famous Shanidar Cave in Iraq show evidence of possible conductive hearing loss. Several of the skeletons dating…
-
Is global warming making fish deaf?
Global warming could be causing fish deafness New research is suggesting that ocean acidification is causing some fish to lose their hearing. Scientists from universities in New Zealand and Australia have discovered that elevated levels of carbon dioxide in our oceans is changing the inner ears of fish, leading to hearing loss. Sound plays a key role in the way thousands of species communicate, find mates, and locate suitable, safe places to live. When researchers measured what happened to the hearing of the Australasian snapper, a reef fish, when larvae develop in a more acidic ocean they found juvenile snapper were up to 10 times less sensitive to sound.…
-
Apps to help with Tinnitus
Tinnitus? There’s an app for that If the stress of the past year has caused you to develop tinnitus, or worsened an existing problem, the team at The Hearing Clinic can help with our proven tinnitus management support. However, there are now a number of smartphone apps to help you manage the condition day-to-day. From sound masking, to teaching you more about tinnitus and even providing breathing techniques, there really is ‘an app for that’. myNoise Available for Android and iOS devices, myNoise offers a huge library of soundscapes to mask the tinnitus. You can tailor each sound to your own preferences too. NatureSpace Superb natural soundscapes, including six…
-
Testing hearing on the International Space Station
KUDUwave audiometer. Hearing tests take off in space A new, South African made, portable audiometer, will soon be testing the hearing of crew members onboard the International Space Station. The International Space Station, or ISS, is a noisy place, and even the experience of getting to and from it can be a risk to hearing. In fact, NASA’s audiology studies detect that astronauts’ hearing is at risk due to the challenges of their job. Some time ago NASA started exploring ways to better monitor astronaut health in long space missions, but existing audiometry machines were simply too elaborate and heavy to get into, and operate in, space. Cue the KUDUwave,…
-
Shunts and visiting an audiology clinic.
Do you have a PVP shunt? If you have no idea what we’re talking about, then, chances are, you don’t. However, if you have hydrocephalus, a build-up of fluid in the brain caused by excess cerebrospinal fluid, and you have had a PVP fitted, you must tell us before you have a hearing assessment. The pressure caused by the excess fluid is usually resolved with a surgically implanted device that drains the fluid away. These devices are known as shunts, and some are programmable – known as PVP shunts. PVP shunts have a magnetically adjustable valve placed under the skin, often on or near the mastoid bone, so that…
-
Making the link – stress and hearing loss
April has been Stress Awareness Month since 1992. However, stress, and mental health, have been much in the news over the past year, as the restrictions, fears and job losses generated by the Covid-19 pandemic have taken their toll. While reducing stress is vital for your emotional and mental wellbeing, did you know that reducing its physical impact on you could help to prevent hearing damage? How does stress impact your hearing? Many people understand that long-term stress can lead to problems like high blood pressure and heart disease, but fewer people appreciate that it can also impact our hearing in the form of tinnitus or hearing loss. But how…
-
The first sound recordings from Mars.
Hearing sounds that are out-of-this-world? Perhaps a few times in a lifetime our ears enable us to have unique and unforgettable individual experiences. It may be hearing the cry of your first child as he or she enters the world, or being asked ‘will you marry me?’. Thanks to today’s incredible developments in technology we can also now have unforgettable hearing experiences as a global society. The first alien recording If you’ve been following the adventures of Perseverance, the latest NASA rover to land on Mars, you may know that, as well as being equipped with state of the art cameras, an X-ray spectrometer, radar and weather station, Perseverance has…
-
Can new earbud tech treat disease?
A new start-up is using special earbuds to channel electrical pulses into the outer ear to ‘hack’ into the brain’s neural circuits with the aim of treating disease. The company, Nēsos, is targeting the vagus nerve, which connects the brain to key organs, with the aim of regulating inflammation and treating rheumatoid arthritis. It’s producing some interesting results. In a study, 30 people with rheumatoid arthritis used the earbuds for a few minutes a day, for three months. By the end of the study, half of them had improved in a clinically meaningful way. More than half of those who had benefited showed a 20% improvement, a third improved by…
-
Seeing noise differently in lockdown
At The Hearing Clinic we’re very focused on noise. After all, very loud noise experienced at work or during leisure pursuits can cause irreversible hearing damage – something we often see in our clients. Few people probably realise that noise is considered pollution but the World Health Organisation has stated that noise pollution is the second most dangerous environmental risk factor for humans after air pollution. The world goes quiet We’ve been watching with interest the noise-related side effects of the last year’s lockdowns across the world. Like many people, we were amazed at the photos of usually-bustling city centres reduced to silence – particularly when wild animals began to…
-
One step closer to a cure for hearing loss?
If you have a hearing loss, you’ll probably know that this can be as a result of damage to the specialist hair cells that are found in the inner ear. These cells are crucial for hearing, because they either amplify sounds that come into the ear, or change sound waves into electrical signals for the brain to interpret. New research Now, a study by researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) in the US has determined the role that a critical protein plays in the development of these special inner ear hair cells. The researchers, keen to understand how these cells develop, have found that the protein,…
