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Youth Hearing Loss Spikes

One in five American teens now suffer from some form of hearing loss, according to a study by the Journal of the American Medical Association. In 1994 that rate was roughly one in eight. Much of this rise in teen hearing loss is attributed to Noise-Induced Hearing Loss (NIHL). A form of hearing loss that develops when the mechanisms of the inner ear are damaged by prolonged exposure to harmful sound levels.

Hearing loss in adolescents and teens can be caused by common recreational activities such as concerts, hunting trips or listening to headphones too loudly, according to Megan Moreno, M.D. in the Journal of the American Medical Association Pediatrics. Moreno singled out headphones in particular, “The increase in hearing loss may be partly due to the popularity of headphones used by adolescents.”

Headphones themselves are not the culprits, but rather common headphone usage, especially among youths. Listening to music too loud for too long can damage hair cells in the inner ear that that help your ear translate a sound wave into an electrical signal for your brain.

For parents, the questions is, “how loud is too loud?” Dave Russell learned the answer the hard way. “Every morning I’d drive my daughter Niki to school, and I could hear the music from her headphones over the car radio. I would ask, ‘Is that too loud?’ But she always told me ‘No,’” says Russell.

A few years later, Niki had her hearing tested through school and was diagnosed with NIHL. The doctors told them that the likely cause was listening to headphones too loud for too long. Having a tech background, Russell sought out audio engineers and audiologists in a multiyear process that resulted in him founding Puro Sound Labs which produces high-quality headphones with a volume limiting mechanism to keep adolescents and teens in the under-85-decibel safe listening zone. Sound above 85 decibels, roughly the level of a lawn mower, is considered damaging.

Most headphones max out at roughly 105 decibels, which may not seem like it is much louder, but since the decibel scale is exponential in terms of intensity, sounds at 105 decibels are 100 times more intense than sounds at the safe cutoff of 85 decibels. Moreno recommends earplugs at concerts, earmuffs for loud outdoor activities, and headphones that limit volume at or below 85 decibels.

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