Types of Hearing Loss
Hearing loss can be temporary or permanent. It often comes on gradually as you get older, but it can sometimes happen suddenly.
There are four types of hearing loss:
- The most common type is sensorineural hearing loss, which results from missing or damaged sensory cells (hair cells) in the cochlea and is usually permanent. With this type of loss, sounds do not seem clear. However, sensorineural hearing loss may also result from injury, exposure to loud noises, diabetes, ototoxic medications, heredity, and a variety of diseases. Sensorineural hearing loss is often successfully treated with hearing instruments.
- Conductive hearing lossresults from disorders in the outer or middle ear. Sounds are prevented from reaching the inner ear, so they sound faint and/or distorted. Common causes for conductive hearing loss may include wax build-up, infection or fluid in the middle ear, foreign objects in the ear canal, or a perforated eardrum. Generally, medical procedures or surgery will successfully treat conductive loss for complete or partial hearing improvement. Conductive hearing losses are usually mild or moderate in degree, ranging from 25 to 65 decibels. In some cases, a conductive hearing loss can be temporary.
- Mixed hearing lossis a combined loss of both sensorineural and conductive hearing. It results from problems in both the inner and outer or middle ear. Treatment options may include medication, surgery, hearing aids, a middle ear hearing implantor a bone conduction implant.
- The neural hearing lossoccurs when the auditory nerve cannot send signals to the brain. Neural hearing loss is usually profound and permanent. Hearing aids and cochlear implants cannot help because the nerve is not able to pass on sound information to the brain.
