explain why, even with a complete conductive hearing loss?
William asked:
the hearing threshold shift is limited to about 55dB. hence suggest a method to distinguish between conductive and sensorineural hearing loss?
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the hearing threshold shift is limited to about 55dB. hence suggest a method to distinguish between conductive and sensorineural hearing loss?
September 7th, 2009 at 1:00 am
I have sensorineural hearing loss in my right ear - the cranial nerve that connects my brain to my ear was damaged in an accident years ago and I cannot hear anything out of that ear, it cannot be surgically repaired, and will never heal on its own, so it is permanently deaf. Other causes include problems with the hair cells in the Cochlea (hair cells sense sound vibration and translate the vibration into a neural signal), and problems in the hearing centers in the brain itself.
Conductive hearing loss is when there is an injury to the outer ear - the tympanic membrane (eardrum) or the three bones that connect the eardrum to the Cochlea, the inner ear is infected or filled with fluid, the ear is plugged up with earwax… all of these are mechanical problems that either prevent sound vibrations from causing the inner ear to vibrate or prevent the sound vibrations from getting to the inner ear in the first place. Many of these problems can be repaired surgically or with a thorough cleaning of the ear canal. Check out Wikipedia for the descriptions and an anatomical drawing.
September 8th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
I also have sensorineural hearing loss in my right ear! This is a guess, but the skull itself and surrounding tissue would presumably conduct sound/vibration even if the conductive mechanism in the ear was not working. I was quite young when I had tests but I seem to remember someone pressing something (might have been a tuning fork?) to the bony bit behind my ear to see if I could hear the tone…