Four simple ways to prioritize your hearing health (2024)

Hearing allows us to enjoy music, experience the sounds of nature or take in the words spoken by those around us. Our hearing is also pivotal when it comes to our safety and spatial orientation. However,most people don’t adequately protect their hearing and instead adopt habits that can put it at risk.Often individuals are not aware of the damage they are causing.Keep reading as Connect Hearing outlines four simple and easy ways you can better prioritize your hearing health.

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1. Avoid exposure to excessive noise

Noise is one of the most common causes of hearing loss. It can hit you anywhere—in traffic, at yourworkplace and even in your free time. Take the following preventative measures to protect yourself:

• Use hearing protection at noisy workplaces such as factories or construction sites;
• Avoid spending long periods of time in noisy places indoors;
• When attending shows and parties, stay away from the speakers;
• Avoid listening to loud music for long periods of time. When it comes to speakers, a volume ofless than 80 decibels would be ideal. If you are listening to music at 80-85 decibels or more, youshouldn’t do so for longer than eight hours.

2. Avoid using headphones for prolonged periods of time

Excessive use of headphones at a loud volume may permanently damage your hearing and cause tinnitus, headaches and irritability. This is because your headphones produce high-intensity sound waves inside your ears that are too much for the hearing cells responsible for sound absorption. This overload can cause injuries that in turn impair your hearing.

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Take the following protective measures to preventproblems resulting from the use of such devices:

• If possible, use headphones that cover your ears. These headphones have better noise cancelling abilities, allowing you to listen to music at a lower volume;
• Don’t exceed a volume of 60 decibels.

3. Clean your ears correctly

Though cleaning one’s ears with cotton swabs is regarded as a healthy habit, their use can cause serious problems with your hearing.

Earwax is responsible for protecting and lubricating your ear canal and prevents water, dirt and foreign objects from entering. This is why it must not be removed from the ear canal. Moreover, cotton swabs can cause injuries during insertion that can result in infections, ear drum perforation and hearing loss.

For these reasons, the best way to clean one’s ear is to only clean the outside of the ear. Never insert any materials into your ear canal since your body can discharge the wax inside by itself. If your ear still requires cleaning, consult your physician or audiologist to have them clean it or remove excess wax from your ear.

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4. Visit your audiologist regularly

At first, patients usually don’t notice that they are losing their hearing since the process is a slow andquiet one. Because of this, many individuals wait too long before they start doing something about theirhearing loss.

In many cases, hearing loss — detected early on —is treatable, with the patient’s quality of life and general health beingsignificantly improved. This is why it’s important you consult an audiologist once a year.

Besides checking for hearing issues, your hearing care professional can examine things such as the general health of your ears, as well as diagnosing possible allergies or infections and other types of structural injuries.

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Designed for active lifestyles, 100 per cent invisible Lyric™ hearing aids can be worn playing sports, cycling, exercising, with headphones and can even be worn in the shower. If you’re experiencing hearing loss or tinnitus, book a free hearing test with the experienced Hearing Care Professionals at World of Hearing, and find out if Lyric™ hearing aids are the right fit for you.

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For a limited time, you can try Lyric™ risk-free for 30 days. Call 1-888-780-5358 or visit worldofhearing.ca to book your appointment. Lyric™ is also fit at select Connect Hearing locations. Visit connecthearing.ca to find a location near you.

Legal: VAC, WCB, WSIB, WorkSafe BC, ADP & ODSP accepted. *Hearing evaluations/tests are free for customers over the age of 18. Fees may apply where specific testing for employment purposes, reports, a copy of your results or the completion of an application is required. See clinic for full details. **Lyric is water resistant, not waterproof. Therefore, underwater swimming and diving are not recommended. However, Lyric can be worn in the shower or during water activities in which the head is not fully submerged under water. The $125 per ear fee is waived for 30-day trial. Some conditions apply. See clinic for full details.

This story was provided by Connect Hearing for commercial purposes.

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