Hearing screenings are the only accurate way to determine your hearing health at all stages, from no hearing loss to mild, moderate, severe, and profound. Annual screenings allow you to track the amount of change with zero guesswork.
Why it matters
Early detection makes early treatment possible, which offers wide-ranging benefits for children and adults.
- For children, healthy hearing improves learning and social skills and the misdiagnosis of learning problems when hearing loss is the issue that needs treatment
- Prevents misdiagnosing cognitive decline
- Early treatment reduces the risk of cognitive decline (including dementia) and falling
- Prevents anxiety and depression arising from social isolation due to untreated hearing loss
- Timely treatment of evolving hearing loss
A closer look
It's wise to self-monitor your hearing, too. Notifying your audiologist of changes you detect will help them provide more precise treatment. Changes you should report include
- Hearing is worse in one ear
- Straining to follow conversations in noisy places and on the phone
- Turning up the volume
- Difficulty hearing high-pitched sounds and voices
- Tinnitus
- Pressure in your ear(s)
Other changes to report: cognitive difficulties, loneliness, mood changes, less balance, and fatigue.
Another perspective
Others may perceive someone’s untreated hearing loss as:
- Learning issues
- Cognitive decline, including dementia
- Being clumsy
- Having social problems
Degrees of hearing loss
The following table outlines the four degrees of hearing loss by their symptoms.
Hearing loss is a health risk
Left untreated, hearing loss erodes the quality of our relationships with family and friends and increases our risk of dementia and falling (every 19 seconds, a person falls in the US, breaking a hip).
Call to schedule a free, 15-minute hearing screening with an audiologist. Don't guess about hearing loss. Find out.
If you have hearing loss, your audiologist will explain —
- How much hearing you've lost
- Whether your hearing needs treatment
- The hearing-aid options available to treat your hearing loss
Don't let hearing loss get in the way of your health and happiness.
Crest Hill: 630-633-5060 | Palos Hills: 708-599-9500
