Feature Channels: Hearing

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There’s a cast of characters deep inside your ears -- many kinds of tiny cells working together to allow you to hear. The lead actors, called hair cells, play the crucial role in carrying sound signals to the brain. But new research shows that when it comes to restoring lost hearing ability, the spotlight may fall on some of the ear’s supporting actors – and their understudies.

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Patients with tinnitus hear phantom noise and are sometimes so bothered by the perceived ringing in their ears, they have difficulty concentrating. A new therapy does not lessen perception of the noise but appears to help patients cope better with it in their daily lives, according to new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

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Is it possible that hearing loss in one infant from a pair of twins can affect the mother’s speech to both infants? A new acoustics study zeroes in on this question and suggests that not only is this alteration of speech entirely possible, but that mothers speak to both infants as if they are hearing impaired.

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Subjective screening questions do not reliably identify teenagers who are at risk for hearing loss, according to researchers at Penn State College of Medicine. The results suggest that objective hearing tests should be refined for this age group to replace screening questions.

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Scientists have restored the hearing of mice partly deafened by noise, using advanced tools to boost the production of a key protein in their ears. By demonstrating the importance of the protein, called NT3, in maintaining communication between the ears and brain, these new findings pave the way for research in humans that could improve treatment of hearing loss caused by noise exposure and normal aging.

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A team of Georgia Institute of Technology researchers has created speech-to-text software for Google Glass that helps hard-of-hearing users with everyday conversations. A hard-of-hearing person wears Glass while a second person speaks directly into a smartphone. The speech is converted to text, sent to Glass and displayed on its heads-up display.

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Johns Hopkins neuroscientists have discovered the “molecular brakes” that time the generation of important cells in the inner ear cochleas of mice. These “hair cells” translate sound waves into electrical signals that are carried to the brain and are interpreted as sounds. If the arrangement of the cells is disordered, hearing is impaired.

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A new type of hybrid cochlear device that combines a hearing aid for low frequency sound and an electric stimulator for high frequency sound has been implanted by surgeons at University Hospitals Case Medical Center.

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Researchers at Johns Hopkins have mapped the sound-processing part of the mouse brain in a way that keeps both the proverbial forest and the trees in view. Their imaging technique allows zooming in and out on views of brain activity within mice, and it enabled the team to watch brain cells light up as mice “called” to each other. The results, which represent a step toward better understanding how our own brains process language, appear online July 31 the journal Neuron.

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Understanding how hearing works has long been hampered by challenges associated with seeing inside the inner ear, but technology being developed by a team of researchers, including one from Texas A&M University, is generating some of the most detailed images of the inner ear to date.

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Retired NFL players may be at risk for permanent hearing loss and tinnitus, according to Loyola University Medical Center ear surgeon John Leonetti, MD.

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Henry Ford Health System, in collaboration with Wayne State University, is one of four sites worldwide involved in a clinical trial that will test a device that uses nervous system stimuli to rewire parts of the brain, in hopes of significantly reducing or removing tinnitus, a chronic ringing of the head or ears that affects more than 50 million people.

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One in 10 Americans has hearing loss that affects their ability to understand normal speech. Exposure to excessive noise also can damage hearing in higher pitches. “Hearing loss due to excessive noise is totally preventable, unlike hearing loss due to old age or a medical condition,” Dr. Bhayani says.

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Children with profound deafness who receive a cochlear implant had as much as five times the risk of having delays in areas of working memory, controlled attention, planning and conceptual learning as children with normal hearing, according to Indiana University research published in JAMA Otolaryngology.

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Both high and low frequency hearing impairment have been linked with sleep apnea in a new study of nearly 14,000 individuals.

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The ability to discern pitch – to hear the difference between “cat,” “bat” and “hat,” for example – hinges on remarkable gradations in specialized cells within the inner ear. New research from the University of Virginia School of Medicine and the National Institute on Deafness and Communication Disorders has explained, for the first time, what controls these cells’ development and patterning – findings crucial to efforts to reverse hearing loss caused by age, loud sounds or other factors.

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Tinnitus affects roughly 50 million people and is now the No. 1 disability among our men and women in uniform, costing the U.S. about $1.7 billion a year to treat. But even with these staggering numbers, there's still no know cure for tinnitus. Today, Dr. Michael Seidman, a national leader in the treatment and study of tinnitus, will present a culmination of years of research at the Combined OTO Spring Meetings in Las Vegas.

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Previously, hair cells have long been considered the most vulnerable elements in the inner ear, but researchers have now shown that nerve fibers are even more vulnerable to damage. They will report their findings of “hidden hearing loss” at the 167th meeting of the ASA.

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When loved ones lose their hearing, audiologists often counsel spouses and family members to speak clearly so they are better understood. But hearing loss professionals say that this well-meaning advice can backfire: clear speech can make you sound angry. A new study, to be presented at the 167th Meeting of the ASA, supports the idea that clear speech can carry negative overtones even when the phrase itself is emotionally neutral.

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Dr. Matthew Bush combines his Appalachian background and clinical expertise to understand and address delayed access to hearing health care for rural children.

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Thirteen-year-old Eliza Peters owes her hearing to her ear surgeries and hearing aids. Now she is paying back by raising money for other children who need hearing aids, but cannot afford them. Her Hear the Cheers! fundraising effort has raised $18,000 so far. Last year, Eliza’s fundraising drive, Hear the Cheers!, raised $18,000.

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After losing an ear to cancer, a patient received a silicone ear that looks remarkably real. A surgeon implanted three small metal posts in the side of the patient's head. Each post is fitted with a magnet. The prosthetic ear also is magnetized, so it sticks to the metal posts.

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Minimizing a person’s sight for as little as a week may help improve the brain’s ability to process hearing.

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Researchers from Massachusetts Eye and Ear, Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Massachusetts General Hospital have demonstrated, for the first time, that aspirin intake correlates with halted growth of vestibular schwannomas (also known as acoustic neuromas), a sometimes lethal intracranial tumor that typically causes hearing loss and tinnitus.

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On his way to creating a digital accordion, SUNY Buffalo State assistant music professor J. Tomás Henriques stumbled upon a device with unique therapeutic applications that he envisions using to treat speech and hearing disorders and memory loss, among other things.

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Although the brain becomes smaller with age, the shrinkage seems to be fast-tracked in older adults with hearing loss, according to the results of a study by researchers from Johns Hopkins and the National Institute on Aging. The findings add to a growing list of health consequences associated with hearing loss, including increased risk of dementia, falls, hospitalizations, and diminished physical and mental health overall.

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A new study finds that ear infections account for approximately $2.88 billion in added health care expenses annually and is a significant health-care utilization concern.

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Implanting tubes in the ears of children who have persistent or recurrent episodes of otitis media with effusion (OME) improves hearing over a short period (up to 9 months post surgery), but this procedure is less likely to improve hearing, speech, language, or other functional outcomes over periods longer than that, according to results of a systematic review by the RTI-University of North Carolina Evidence-based Practice Center.

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Study suggests tubes, adenoidectomy reduce fluid in the middle ear and improve hearing in the short term, but tubes did not improve speech or language for children with middle ear fluid.

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For tens of millions of Americans, a condition called tinnitus means there’s no such thing as the sound of silence. Now, new scientific findings that help explain what is going on inside their unquiet brains

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Craig Dolder, an acoustical engineer, always wanted to go to a Formula 1 Grand Prix but knew he needed to protect himself from the deafening roar of the engines. The advice he found online varied and the technical papers he read provided assessments of sound levels for NASCAR and other races, but he could find nothing that measured the noise levels or dosage specifically for Formula 1. So he decided to conduct his own test.

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A recent paper by Mass. Eye and Ear/Harvard Medical School researchers in collaboration with researchers at the Ecole Normale Superieure, France, challenge the two dominant theories of how people localize sounds, explain why neuronal responses to sounds are so diverse and show how sound can be localized, even with the absence of one half of the brain. Their research is described on line in the journal eLife.

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Scientists paired vagus nerve stimulation with playing tones to decrease the symptoms of tinnitus, a debilitating disorder of ringing in the ears affecting many U.S. veterans and seniors. VNS-tone therapy significantly reduced symptoms in 4/10 patients with effects lasting for more than two months.

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JRRD Volume 50, Issue 7, produced by the Journal of Rehabilitation Research and Development (JRRD) and the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is now available online at http://www.rehab.research.va.gov/ jour/2013/507/contents507.html.

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Computer engineers and hearing scientists at The Ohio State University have made a potential breakthrough in solving a 50-year-old problem in hearing technology: how to help the hearing-impaired understand speech in the midst of background noise.

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Short-term hearing loss during childhood may lead to persistent hearing deficits, long after basic auditory sensitivity has returned to normal. Mass. Eye and Ear researchers gain new insight into how this works.

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Behavioral abnormalities are traditionally thought to originate in the brain. But a new study by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University has found that inner-ear dysfunction can directly cause neurological changes that increase hyperactivity.

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A telemedicine initiative in Vanderbilt’s Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences is working to make follow-up hearing tests for newborns more accessible in rural areas of Tennessee, while teaching young pediatric audiology and pediatric speech language pathology students to treat patients remotely.

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University of Utah bioengineers discovered our understanding of language may depend more heavily on vision than previously thought: under the right conditions, what you see can override what you hear.

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People with cataract-related vision loss who have had cataract surgery to improve their sight are living longer than those with visual impairment who chose not to have the procedure, according to an Australian cohort study published this month in Ophthalmology, the journal of the American Academy of Ophthalmology. After comparing the two groups, the researchers found a 40 percent lower long-term mortality risk in those who had the surgery.

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University of Iowa researchers say that the common fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, is an ideal model to study hearing loss in humans caused by loud noise. The reason: The molecular underpinnings to its hearing are roughly the same as with people.

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Six Loyola University Medical Center audiologists recently teamed up with the Chicago Bears to provide hearing screenings to more than 150 disadvantaged children and their parents.

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A novel new reading and writing program was recently introduced by the House Research Institute’s Children’s Auditory Research and Evaluation (CARE) Center for preschool age children with hearing loss who come from Spanish-speaking homes, and their parents.

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Children born with a complete absence of the external ear canal, even if only one ear is affected, are more likely than their peers to struggle in school, according to new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

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A research project at Kansas State University has the potential to treat human deafness and loss of balance.

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Indiana University scientists have transformed mouse embryonic stem cells into key structures of the inner ear. The discovery provides new insights into the sensory organ's developmental process and sets the stage for laboratory models of disease, drug discovery and potential treatments for hearing loss and balance disorders.

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4TH of July Fireworks And Marching Bands Are Hard On The Ears; in today’s disposable society, hearing is an endangered species. “Once hearing is damaged, it cannot be repaired,” said Jyoti Bhayani, a certified audiologist at Gottlieb Memorial Hospital, part of Loyola University Health System. “And hearing aids have yet to become coveted status accessories so young people need to wise up and turn the volume down on their earbuds.”

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Obese adolescents are more likely than their normal-weight counterparts to have hearing loss, according to results of a new study. Findings showed that obese adolescents had increased hearing loss across all frequencies and were almost twice as likely to have unilateral (one-sided) low-frequency hearing loss.

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Older adults with hearing loss are more likely than peers with normal hearing to require hospitalization and suffer from periods of inactivity and depression, according to results of a new study by experts at Johns Hopkins.

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Hearing loss (HL) is a chronic condition that affects nearly 2 of every 3 adults aged 70 years or older in the United States. Hearing loss has broader implications for older adults, being independently associated with poorer cognitive and physical functioning. The association of HL with other health economic outcomes, such as health care use, is unstudied.