Around one out of every seven people are estimated to deal with tinnitus. That puts the total number in the millions. In some countries, the numbers are even higher and that’s pretty alarming.
True, tinnitus isn’t always recurring. But in those cases where buzzing, ringing, or humming in your ears is hard to shake, finding a reliable remedy can very quickly become a priority. One of the most practical of such treatments is already quite common: hearing aids.
There are some connections between tinnitus and hearing loss but they are in fact separate conditions. you can have hearing loss without tinnitus or tinnitus without hearing loss. But if you are experiencing the two conditions together, which is fairly common, hearing aids can treat both at the same time.
How Can Tinnitus be Treated by Hearing Aids?
According to one study, 60% of individuals who suffer from tinnitus observed some amount of relief when they began using hearing aids. Roughly 22% of everyone surveyed reported significant relief. But, hearing aids are not manufactured specifically to treat tinnitus. The benefits seem to come by association. As such, hearing aids seem to be most effective if you have tinnitus and hearing loss.
Here’s how hearing aids can help stop tinnitus symptoms:
- Everything gets a little bit louder: When you have loss of hearing, the volume of the outside world (or, at least, particular wavelengths of the world) can fade away and become quieter. The ringing in your ears, then, is much more obvious. It’s the loudest thing you hear because it is not decreased by your hearing loss. The ringing or buzzing that was so obvious will be obscured when your hearing aid boosts the outside sound. As you tune out your tinnitus, it becomes less of an issue.
- It becomes less difficult to engage in conversations: Increasing the volume of human speech is something modern hearing aids are particularly good at. This means carrying on a conversation can be much easier once you’re routinely using your devices. You will be more engaged with your co-worker’s story about their children and better able to participate with your spouse about how their day went. When you have a balanced interactive social life tinnitus can appear to fade into the background. Socializing also helps decrease stress, which is related to tinnitus.
- Your brain is getting an auditory workout: When you experience hearing loss, those regions of your brain charged with interpreting sounds can frequently suffer from fatigue, stress, or atrophy. Tinnitus symptoms you might be experiencing can be decreased when the brain is in a healthy flexible condition and hearing aids can help keep it that way.
Modern Hearing Aids Come With Many Advantages
Smart Technology is incorporated into modern hearing aids. To some degree, that’s because they feature the latest technologies and hearing assistance algorithms. But the efficiency of modern hearing aids is accomplished in part because each device can be customized and calibrated on a patient-by-patient basis (they can even detect the amount of background noise and automatically recalibrate accordingly).
Personalizing hearing aids means that the sensitivity and output signals can easily be calibrated to the specific hearing levels you may have. The better your hearings aid works for you, the more likely they are to help you cover up the humming or buzzing from tinnitus.
The Best Way to Get Rid of Tinnitus
This will most likely depend on your level of hearing loss. There are still treatment solutions for your tinnitus even if you don’t have any hearing loss. That could mean custom-made masking devices, medication, or cognitive behavioral therapy.
But, 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. Managing your hearing impairment with a good set of hearing aids can often stop tinnitus from making your life difficult.