What is hearing loss?

Hearing loss affects more than half of adults aged 60 and over in Australia. If untreated, it can have a significant impact on your quality of life, emotional and physical well-being, and can even lead to psychological and social problems. 

More specifically, hearing loss can:

- Impact individuals’ ability to hear friends and family members;

- Make listening to the TV and radio more difficult;

- Make following conversation in group situations and background noise more difficult;

- Increase risk of safety or misjudging the distance and direction of sounds such as oncoming traffic when crossing the road;

- lead to experiences of fatigue, frustration and social withdrawal.

Age-related hearing loss (presbyacusis) develops gradually over many years. This gradual deterioration in your hearing is difficult to notice. This can make people inclined to believe that others are ‘mumbling’ and not speaking clearly, rather than it being due to them no longer hearing as well as they once did.

When left untreated, hearing loss can lead to ‘auditory deprivation’. This means the ears and brain are not hearing and processing sounds for prolonged periods of time. This can lead to the loss of ability to hear and process information effectively. The saying goes “use it or lose it’ rings true with our ears and hearing.

Two main types of hearing loss which occur in different parts of the hearing pathway:

1. Conductive hearing loss – due to a blockage of some sort in the outer and/or middle ear.

2. Sensorineural hearing loss – Permanent damage to the organ of hearing (cochlea) and/or hearing (auditory) nerve located in the ‘inner’ ear.