Listen Up: Why Taking Care of Your Hearing Health Matters
With Heidi Hill, AuD
Season 8, Episode 19 | July 23, 2024
One in four people are projected to have some degree of hearing loss by 2025, according to the World Health Organization — and hearing loss is connected to several deeper health impacts, including cognitive decline and cardiovascular function. Heidi Hill, AuD, shares what causes hearing loss, why it sometimes can be hidden, how it can affect the body, and what we can do to protect our auditory systems.
Heidi Hill, AuD, is an audiologist with more than 28 years of experience. She’s the owner of Hearing Health Clinic, an audiology private practice located in Osseo, Minn., where she focuses on patient- and family-centered care that considers the entire auditory system, from the ear to the brain. Hill is passionate about integrating more functional hearing assessments and remediation that consider hearing, listening, and communicating ear-to-brain.
Chronic noise exposure is on the rise — social noise has tripled since the early 1980s, and it’s estimated that more than 1 billion young adults are at risk of permanent, avoidable hearing loss due to unsafe listening practices.
Before you can take mitigation measures, it’s helpful to first understand what safe, and unsafe, exposure to noise looks like. To give you an idea, here are average decibel levels for some everyday sounds:
| Sound | Decible |
|---|---|
| Rainfall | 50 dB |
| Conversation | 60 dB |
| City street | 70 dB |
| Movie theater | 70-104 dB |
| Hairdryer | 90 dB |
| Snowblower | 106 dB |
| Concert | 120 dB |
| Jackhammer | 130 dB |
Hill emphasizes that it’s important to realize that the effects are not only a result of how loud the sounds are, but also the duration of your exposure. For example, if you work in an environment that’s at an 85-decibel level, OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) advises the use of ear plugs as damage starts to occur after about eight hours at this level.
However, Hill also shares that newer research shows that damage to the synapses that connect the ear to nerves can happen much quicker — though damage may not show up right away. It can take one to two years for nerves to die after synaptic damage, so most people feel like they’re fine and can go about their same activities. Hill stresses this is why the use of ear plugs is critical, especially in situations like professional sports games or concerts where synapse damage can occur in as little as eight to 30 seconds.
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Transcript: Listen Up: Why Taking Care of Your Hearing Health Matters
Season 8, Episode 19 | July 23, 2024
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