Health Tips - Be kinder to your ears, please!

Be kinder to your ears, please!:

Research shows modern living is too noisy for our ears. Here's how you can be kinder to them

Our ears at all ages are in danger from the sounds of the modern world. Look around and you'll realise that we are personally responsible for most of it — MP3 players, iPods, nightclubs, hair dryers, and motorcycles inflict injury on our delicate and sensitive hearing apparatus. Sound waves entering the ear set off vibrations in the flexible eardrum. Loud noise can test this membrane to ear-splitting points.

Here's how it happens
A chain of tiny bones transmits the vibrations to the cochlea in the inner ear where fluid carries them to rows of hair cells. These stimulate fibres in our hearing nerve along which impulses travel to the hearing centre in the brain, and we hear sounds. The most sensitive bit of this whole chain is the hair cells in the inner ear.

Very loud noises over an extended period actually kill off the hair cells and once dead, they stay that way. They can't be replaced. This damage to the hair cells further adds up.

So, every loud Friday night at the club inflicts cumulative damage and you can't go back. Damage in your teenage years shows up as deafness in middle age.

Doctors say, we measure sound in decibels and hearing loss begins at 85 decibels. That is the noise a hair dryer or a food mixer makes — MP3s or iPods inflict worse, mainly because we tend to over use them. In fact, a study in 2006 showed more than one third of adults and more than half of teenagers listened to MP3s with the volume turned up high. It is too loud if other people can hear what you are listening to.

Measures to follow
But you don't need to shun all of them to protect your fragile ears. There are steps we can all take to protect our ears, even down to wearing ear plugs while you dry your hair. Some MP3 players can produce sound levels equal to a jet taking off. If you listen with earphones that drown out people speaking that's too much, throttle back. Remember, at a given volume, ear buds deliver more noise than headphones that cover the ear. Choose loose ones and never insert them tightly into your ears. Pick only over-the-ear headphones that cut out the background noise so you can listen at a lower volume. Also, beware noisy children's toys, otherwise you're inflicting damage on your child's ears at a very early age.

Avoid cap guns, talking dolls, walkietalkies, squeaky toys. They are cute but extremely damaging. Toy sirens and squeaky rubber toys can make sounds of 90 decibels — as loud as a lawn mower and just as damaging. At a nightclub, make sure you are standing far away from the speakers and enjoying the music.