Are you’re ears still ringing?

Questions….

How many times has your head hit the pillow from a night out with friends at the local nightclub and you have the ringing / buzzing sound in your ears?

You’ve taken out your MP3 player earphones and you can still hear the baseline?

If your friend’s can hear the music from your headphones when sat next to you.

If you’ve answered yes to either or all of the above, then you could be online to damaging your hearing permanently or suffering from permanent noise in your head called tinnitus.

According to www.Dontlosethemusic.com 66% of people are listening to music louder than 85 decibels and so risking permanent tinnitus and hearing damage.

How is this quote relevant to me? Let us explain the workings of the ear for those that may have forgotten from their biology lessons.

 

The hearing organ is a complex and delicate instrument that has to cope with whatever is “thrown” at it.  From the tiniest whimper to a jet engine, our hearing system has to process, decipher and interpret a myriad of incoming signals.

The outer ear is the visible part of the ear on either side of the head and includes the ear canals that go into the head.  The fleshy parts of the outer ear act as “collectors” of sound waves, which then travel down the ear canal to the eardrum.    

The eardrum is a membrane of tissue that separates the outer ear from the middle ear.   The sound waves cause the eardrum to vibrate and this vibration is passed on to the middle ear which has a chamber containing three small bones called the “ossicles”.    The energy from the sound waves causes the bones, using a lever action, to channel and concentrate the sound energy down the chain of the ossicles to the smallest bone in the body the stapes.  The stapes, often referred to as the stirrup, pushes the energy onto a second membrane, located on the cochlea, which is part of the inner ear.    

The “cochlea” is shaped like a snail’s shell and is found in the inner ear.  It contains tiny cells called hair cells which move in response to the vibrations passed from the ossicles.  The movement of these hair cells generates an electrical signal that is transmitted to the brain via the auditory nerve.  In the brain, these signals are translated into meaningful information, such as language or music with qualities like volume and pitch.    

One side affect of noise-induced hearing loss is Tinnitus.  Tinnitus is a noise generated inside your head not from the outside environment.  Sufferers report a ringing, buzzing, or roaring in the ears or head.  Hearing loss and tinnitus may be experienced in one or both ears, and tinnitus may continue constantly or occasionally throughout a lifetime.

Our hearing is as precious as our sight: a fact that people only tend to recognize when they are faced with loosing it.

Sound / noise levels are measured in decibels (dB).  The higher the decibel level, the louder (painful) the noise is.  Sounds louder than 80 decibels are considered potentially hazardous, below are a sample of sounds.

 

Painful

150 dB = rock music peak

140 dB = firearms, jet engine

120 dB = amplified rock music at 4-6 ft., car stereo, band practice

Extremely Loud

110 dB = rock music, model airplane

100 dB = chain saw, pneumatic drill

90 dB = lawnmower, London Underground

Very Loud

80 dB = alarm clock

70 dB = busy traffic, vacuum cleaner

60 dB = dishwasher

Moderate

50 dB = moderate rainfall

40 dB = quiet room

Faint

30 dB = whisper, quiet library

Scientists believe that, depending on the type of noise, the pure force of vibrations from the noise can cause hearing loss. Recent studies also show that exposure to harmful noise levels triggers the formation of molecules inside the ear that damage hair cells and result in noise-induced hearing loss. These destructive molecules play an important role in hearing loss in children and adults who listen to loud noise for too long.

Other side affects you won’t associate with noise increased fatigue, irritability which can hamper your learning and job performance.  

Listen – Don’t stop the music! just turn down the volume not the fidelity

Volume

While the revolution in MP3 and phone technology has given us all the benefit of music on the move, an unwelcome side effect is we are pumping up the volume into our ears and at a far earlier age than ever before. 

One answer is to pump up the “fidelity” – or quality of the sound – without twisting the volume knob.  Adjusting the EQ settings of a music player to dial in the right mix of treble and bass frequencies can go a long way to ensure that every note is heard and every word is understood.

Turning the volume down slightly is such a simple thing to do and will enable today’s generation to continue to enjoy their music for years to come. 

A scary fact, that between 2.5 million and 10 million Europeans could suffer hearing loss from listening to MP3 players at unsafe volumes – over 89 decibels – for more than an hour daily for at least five years.

MP3 players now sold have maximum sound levels ranging between 80 and 115 decibels. Using different earphones could add a further 9 decibels.  Above 120 decibels is equivalent to the level of noise generated by an airplane taking off.

Sales of digital players has jumped in recent years, and some 50-100 million people are believed to listen to them on a daily basis, the EU says.

Earphones

Also by using high-quality earphones help eliminate as much background noise as possible.

Earphones broadcast powerful sound waves directly into the ear canal, there’s a much greater potential for hearing loss.

Experts agree that a person should never turn the volume all the way up on any personal music player, as the sound can easily exceed 100 decibels (dB).  Prolonged exposure to volume levels of this magnitude – as loud as a chain saw slicing through a tree – can lead to a condition called tinnitus.

The EU’s Consumer Affairs Commissioner, Meglena Kuneva is campaigning for manufacturers to recommend users turn down the volume to preserve their hearing.

Action

Limit periods of exposure to noise.  Avoid dancing or standing close to speakers at clubs, gigs or festivals.  Use the chill out areas to give your ears a break.   If you want to watch main act at the front of the stage, then perhaps watch the support from further back.

Wearing hearing protectors. Cotton wool in your ears won’t work!  Wearing specially designed earplugs (not swimmer’s plugs) will work. These start from £10.  Not much to preserve your hearing! 

To find out more about hearing protectors click here  

Have your hearing tested. Use your initial test as a benchmark to checking that your hearing is declining. 

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 10th, 2010 at 12:46 pm and is filed under EAR PROTECTION. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.