Let’s pretend you go to a rock show. You’re cool, so you spend the entire night up front. It’s not exactly hearing-healthy, but it’s fun, and the next morning, you wake up with both ears ringing. (That’s not as fun.)
But what happens if you can only hear out of one ear when you wake up? The rock concert is most likely not to blame in that situation. Something else could be at work. And you might be a little concerned when you experience hearing loss in only one ear.
Moreover, your general hearing may not be working properly. Your brain is accustomed to processing signals from two ears. So it can be disorienting to get signals from only one ear.
Hearing loss in one ear creates problems, this is why
Your ears basically work together (no pun intended) with each other. Just like having two front facing eyes helps your depth perception and visual clarity, having two side facing ears helps you hear more effectively. So when one of your ears quits working correctly, havoc can happen. Amongst the most prevalent effects are the following:
- You can have trouble identifying the direction of sounds: Someone calls your name, but you have no idea where they are! When your hearing goes out in one ear, it’s really very difficult for your brain to triangulate the origin of sounds.
- When you’re in a loud setting it becomes extremely difficult to hear: With only one functioning ear, noisy settings like restaurants or event venues can suddenly become overwhelming. That’s because your ears can’t figure out where any of that sound is originating from.
- You can’t tell how loud anything is: You need both ears to triangulate direction, but you also need both to determine volume. Think about it this way: If you can’t figure out where a sound is coming from, it’s impossible to know whether that sound is quiet or just distant.
- Your brain gets exhausted: When you lose hearing in one ear, your brain can become extra tired, extra fast. That’s because it’s desperately trying to compensate for the lack of hearing from one of your ears. And when hearing loss suddenly occurs in one ear, that’s particularly true. This can make all kinds of tasks throughout your day-to-day life more exhausting.
So what’s the cause of hearing loss in one ear?
Hearing experts call impaired hearing in one ear “unilateral hearing loss” or “single-sided hearing loss.” While the more ordinary kind of hearing loss (in both ears) is usually caused by noise-related damage, single-sided hearing loss is not. This means that it’s time to look at other possible factors.
Here are a few of the most common causes:
- Irregular Bone Growth: It’s possible, in very rare instances, that hearing loss on one side can be the result of irregular bone growth. This bone can, when it grows in a particular way, impede your ability to hear.
- Earwax: Yup, occasionally your earwax can become so packed in there that it blocks your hearing. It has a similar effect to using earplugs. If you have earwax blocking your ear, never try to clean it out with a cotton swab. Cotton swabs can push the earwax even further up against the eardrum.
- Meniere’s Disease: Meniere’s Disease is a chronic hearing condition that can cause vertigo and hearing loss. It’s not uncommon with Menier’s disease to lose hearing on one side before the other. Menier’s disease often comes with single sided hearing loss and ringing.
- Ear infections: Ear infections can cause swelling. And this inflammation can close up your ear canal, making it impossible for you to hear.
- Acoustic Neuroma: While the name may sound pretty intimidating, an acoustic neuroma is a benign tumor that grows on the nerves of the inner ear. You should still take this condition seriously, even though it’s not cancerous, it can still be potentially life threatening.
- Other infections: One of your body’s most prevailing responses to an infection is to swell up. It’s just what your body does! This response isn’t always localized, so any infection that produces inflammation can lead to the loss of hearing in one ear.
- Ruptured eardrum: Usually, a ruptured eardrum is hard to miss. Objects in the ear, head trauma, or loud noise (amongst other things) can be the cause of a ruptured eardrum. And it occurs when a hole is created between the thin membrane that divides your ear canal and middle ear. Usually, tinnitus and hearing loss along with a great deal of pain are the outcomes.
So… What can I do about my single-sided hearing loss?
Treatments for single-sided hearing loss will differ based upon the underlying cause. In the case of specific obstructions (such as bone or tissue growths), surgery might be the appropriate option. Some problems, like a ruptured eardrum, will usually heal on their own. And still others, like an earwax based obstruction, can be cleared away by basic instruments.
In some cases, however, your single-sided hearing loss could be permanent. And in these situations, we will help by prescribing one of two hearing aid options:
- Bone-Conduction Hearing Aids: To help you make up for being able to hear from only one ear, these hearing aids make use of your bones to conduct the sound waves to your brain, bypassing most of the ear altogether.
- CROS Hearing Aid: This special kind of hearing aid is designed exclusively for those who have single-sided hearing loss. With this hearing aid, sound is picked up at your bad ear and sent to your good ear where it’s decoded by your brain. It’s very complicated, very cool, and very reliable.
Your hearing specialist is the beginning
If you aren’t hearing out of both of your ears, there’s probably a reason. In other words, this isn’t a symptom you should be ignoring. Getting to the bottom of it is important for hearing and your overall health. So schedule an appointment with us today, so you can begin hearing out of both ears again!
References
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7230949/
https://www.hear-it.org/single-sided-deafness