You can wind up in the hospital if you don’t correctly treat your hearing loss symptoms. You might think that this is somewhat of an exaggeration. We usually consider hearing loss as not much more than a hassle – something that makes the news a bit harder to hear or, at worst, makes you unwittingly agree to something you didn’t mean.
But the long-term health impacts of neglected hearing loss is beginning to get significant attention from researchers.
What Does Hearing Loss Have to do With Your Health?
At first glance, hearing loss doesn’t seem to have much to do with other health concerns. But research carried out by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health suggests that over time, visits to the hospital can increase by as much as 50% for someone with neglected hearing loss. The longer the hearing loss goes untreated, the more significant the health havoc get.
That’s a puzzling finding: how is your general state of health linked to your ability to hear? That question can have a complicated answer.
Hearing Health And Mental Health
Here are a few of the health concerns connected to hearing loss:
- Loss of balance. Hearing loss can make it harder to keep your balance and keep your situational focus.
- Memory can begin failing. In fact, your odds of developing dementia is twice as high with neglected hearing loss.
- Higher instance of anxiety and depression. Basically, the chance of depression and anxiety rises with hearing loss and that will bring about health issues both physical and mental.
Hearing Aids: An effective Answer
There’s some good news though. The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School research reveals that up to 75% of the cognitive decline linked to hearing loss can be stopped in its tracks by one simple solution: wearing a hearing aid.
The health hazards connected to hearing loss can be seriously reduced by wearing hearing aids. The following improvements were revealed in people who wore hearing aids for as little as two weeks:
- Improvements in awareness and balance.
- Improvements in brain function.
- Reductions in traumatic brain injuries.
The team from Johns Hopkins studied data from 77,000 patients accumulated over roughly twenty years. And a crucial part of preserving your health lies in safeguarding your hearing which is a staggering outcome. Taking care of your hearing health also helps your finances, because being sick can be expensive.
Preserving Your Hearing And Your Health
Hearing loss is a perfectly typical part of getting older, though it’s not exclusive to getting older. Because of accidents, occupational hazards, and disease, hearing loss can happen at any age.
However, it’s essential to acknowledge any hearing loss you might be noticing. Your health could depend on it.