Hearing Aids and Meniere’s

Hearing aids, air pressure and drop attacks

Sue wears a hearing aid in her one working ear. Due the level of hearing loss and inability to process the lower end of the sound register, she can’t actually hear unless the sound source is within a foot of her ear.

Also, the Meniere’s has left her unable to process sounds, so it all tends to be a noise soup rather than understandable sounds. But she does have some sounds, even if much of what she receives is annoying, distracting and confusing – and due to amplification and her Tinnitus, distorted.

She can’t listen to TV, music or things we hearing people take for granted. Talking with someone requires lip reading and (if possible) finger spelling. Sue doesn’t complain, which impresses me so much.

An illustration of how much Sue can hear. Recently she asked me what that strange noise was – the source was four helicopters flying about 80 feet above us.

All that does have some relevance to this blog. I’m not able to explain the circumstances, but some years ago Sue was in a situation where she had to wear her aid despite the fact that actually putting it in her ear brought on spin and drop attacks – just part of the fun of Meniere’s Disease.

And this was after a Consultant told us that air pressure didn’t affect Meniere’s – Hah! Sue struggled on whilst looking like she’d been on a four day drinking spree and suffering from decreased hearing ability and raging Tinnitus. We asked those who should know for help but didn’t get much. Then at a bike show my good friend Al introduced me to D (his co-worker) who also had severe hearing loss that required two aids.

Al told me to ask about the nausea and spin attacks D had been having when climbing staging to the top of ships – they work in ship building. I did (it’s not easy speaking about personal problems with a stranger, no matter if you a friend in common). The short story – height affected D as Sue was affected by putting in her aid. Common factor, pressure in the ear.

Someone in the health area D came under suggested drilling a small hole in each aid to relieve the pressure, after which D could climb as high as he needed without waiting for the floor to catch him. Sue and I told someone involved with aid maintenance (the ones who’d been unable to help in the first place) and the response was – yes, of course, we do drill relief holes in the moulding. Outcome was aid in, not as many spin or drop attacks. Very difficult months could have been spared for Sue, but at least she got a solution in the end.

So, if you have a similar problem go and see your aid supplier, it might help. But whatever you do, don’t get the Black and Decker out and get going with a five mm drill bit, this is one you definitely don’t want to try at home. Last thought – was I bitter, you bet.