All About Hearing Loss

Many individuals often ask the question “What is hearing loss and how does it really affect me?” A person with hearing loss generally is able to hear some sounds very well while others seem muted, faint or not at all. 4 out of every 1,000 babies are born with hearing loss, making it one of the most common birth defects in the United States. To further understand what hearing loss is, it helps to understand how we hear. Sound waves entering the ear canal are directed to the eardrum, which conducts vibrations through the small bones of the middle ear to the cochlea. The cochlea is a snail shaped organ, known as the organ of hearing, and is lined with thousands of tiny little hair cells. Each hair cell or nerve ending responds to certain sound frequencies that send nerve impulses to the brain which are interpreted as sounds.

So your brain actually does the hearing, the ears are simply the mechanism to convert sound energy outside your head to nerve impulses your brain translates into sounds. Any sound impulse in your right ear is sent to the left side of your brain and any sound impulse in your left ear is sent to the right side of your brain.