Best Tips to Maintain Your Hearing Health

How to Maintain Hearing Health: Top Tips to Prevent Hearing Loss

Protection of your ears and hearing helps prevent hearing loss and ear-related diseases. As per the WHO’s report, an estimated 63 million people in India live with significant hearing impairment, though prevalence estimates vary depending on diagnostic criteria.

You can easily prevent the common causes of hearing loss without stopping the things that you love to do. Protection from injury and loud noises and proper medication can help keep your ears healthy.

Top 6 Ways to Protect and Improve Your Hearing Loss  

There are various ways to improve and protect hearing, including hearing aids and auditory training. Here are some ways in which you can protect your ears and improve your hearing capacity.

1. Wearing Earplugs around Loud Noises(>85 dB): Loud noises from lawnmowers, firearms, firecrackers, construction sites, and concerts can cause hearing loss. Prolonged exposure to loud noise primarily damages the inner ear hair cells, which do not regenerate and can lead to permanent hearing loss. If you live in any area where you hear these types of noises regularly, use earplugs to protect your ears. Seeking help from an otolaryngologist can guide you to get the best earplugs.
2. Giving Breaks to your Ears: Frequent visits to nightclubs and concerts can be extremely fun, but prolonged exposure can have the potential to cause temporary or permanent hearing loss. If you have a keen interest in visiting nightclubs or concerts frequently, take repeated breaks to separate yourself from the loud noises. After attending the concert, try to stay in a quiet environment to give adequate rest to your ears, which helps their recovery more quickly.   
3. Do not use cotton swabs: The usage of cotton swabs to remove earwax is an old and conventional process around the world. However, as per recent studies, it does more harm than benefit to your ears. Cotton swabs can push earwax deeper into the canal, increasing the risk of impaction, irritation, infection, or injury. A damaged ear canal increases the risk of auditory impairments in adults and children.     
4. Listens to Lower Volumes: Prolonged exposure to loud music daily can easily damage your hearing, specifically when listening through earbuds, which directly affects the eardrums. You can keep the volume at a moderate level when watching television or listening to music through earphones (≤60% max volume for ≤60 mins/day with earbuds) . Consider the use of overhead headphones rather than earbuds while listening to music regularly. Over‑ear headphones may be safer than earbuds because they often provide better noise isolation, allowing listening at lower volumes.
5. Keeping Your Ears Dry: Swimming and bathing in water bodies or a bathtub can increase the risk of entry of water into the ear canal. You need to tilt your head to one side after swimming or bathing to drain out excess water from the ear. If you swim regularly, using earplugs can protect your ears from water.   
6. Using Properly Directed Medications: Sometimes, hearing loss may result from side effects of different drugs like antibiotics, chemotherapy agents, loop diuretics, and high‑dose salicylates. This is commonly known as ototoxicity. If you are taking any of these prescribed drugs, you need to use them as directed by your doctor.

Apart from these, doing regular  physical activity supports cardiovascular health, which may help reduce the risk of age‑related hearing decline. Quit using tobacco products, as nicotine has many side effects, including inducing auditory disorders.

Reader Information: This article is intended for general informational purposes only. Hearing health conditions vary from person to person, and the information provided here should not be used as a substitute for professional medical consultation. Always seek the advice of a qualified healthcare professional, audiologist, or otolaryngologist for any concerns related to hearing loss, ear pain, medication use, or other ear‑related symptoms.

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