Archive for June, 2016

Those who attend concerts expect the music to be loud, and classical music is no exception. Listeners expect a certain level of excitement from a performance, but in light of these expectations, are conductors and musical directors under too much pressure to deliver an earsplitting performance? If so, what becomes of the musicians who are immersed in the potentially harmful sound on a daily basis?

A recent lawsuit in the UK involving Chris Goldscheider, a former viola player for the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden, is suing the ROH claiming they are responsible for his career-ending hearing damage. A renowned musician, Goldscheider had a storied career that took him to places across the globe, from playing with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic to Kylie Minogue to the Three Tenors front of more than 100,000 people in Barcelona prior to joining the Royal Opera House in 2002.

After a performance of Wagner’s Valkyrie, during which the brass instruments directly behind him in the orchestra pit reached dangerously high decibel levels, Goldscheider suffered irreversible hearing damage in the form of an immediate and permanent threshold shift. Almost immediately, Goldscheider was rendered unable to tolerate the sound of his own instrument, which he had been playing since the age of 4. Diagnosed with acoustic shock, symptoms of which include tinnitus and hypersensitivity to sound, his once shining career came to an end. Unable to work, he was forced to sell his house.

The Royal Opera House thus far has denied responsibility. And according to Goldscheider’s lawyer Chris Fry, part of the Royal Opera House’s defense is the claim that the social value of the performance means that potential damage to players’ hearing is an acceptable risk. Please visit our blog for more on this issue.

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From depression and deteriorating relationships with friends and family to reported lower quality of life, hearing loss casts a wide net. And now, a new study confirms those with hearing loss suffer yet another cost: higher medical bills.

The study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), compared the costs of healthcare for a large group of 562,000 privately insured individuals between the ages of 55 and 64, both with and without hearing loss. In addition to being in the same age range, the subjects were similar in terms of employment and the presence of chronic health conditions. Type of insurance coverage was also similar.

Researchers examined healthcare data such as inpatient costs, outpatient costs, prescriptions and hearing care over an 18-month time period and discovered those with hearing loss had significantly higher medical bills than those without hearing loss. How much higher? Overall, those with hearing loss had medical bills that were 33 percent higher than those without hearing loss.

One could surmise that the difference lies simply in the cost of treating hearing care alone, but that is not the case. Yes, the costs of healthcare were higher for those with treated hearing loss than for those without any hearing loss at all, but those who spent the most on healthcare were those with untreated hearing loss. Even taking into account adjustments to the data for those who received hearing treatment such as hearing aids, those being treated for hearing loss still paid significantly less for healthcare than those who had hearing loss but did not receive hearing treatment.

Researchers stress that further study is needed to understand the exact reasons behind the higher medical costs, and how early adoption of hearing aids and other treatment might impact costs in the long run.

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New research into the “ringing in the ears” condition known as tinnitus points to an alarming level of early hearing damage in young people who are exposed to loud music, prompting a warning from leading researchers in the field. It’s a growing problem and I think it’s going to get worse,” says Larry Roberts, PhD, of McMaster University’s Department of Psychology, Neuroscience and Behaviour. “My personal view is that there is a major public health challenge coming down the road in terms of difficulties with hearing.”

The researchers interviewed and performed extensive hearing testing on a group of 170 students between 11 and 17 years old, learning that almost all of them engage in “risky listening habits,” favoring loud music at parties, clubs and on personal listening devices. The results showed that more than a quarter of them are already experiencing persistent tinnitus that more typically affects people over 50.

The researchers report that further testing of the same subjects, showed that even though they could still hear as well as their peers, those experiencing tinnitus were more likely to have a significantly reduced tolerance for loud noise, which is considered a sign of hidden damage to the nerves that are used in processing sound.

Roberts explained that when the auditory nerves are damaged, brain cells increase their sensitivity to their remaining inputs, which can make ordinary sounds seem louder. Increased loudness perception is an indication of nerve injury that cannot necessarily be detected by an audiogram, the standard clinical test for hearing ability. Neuroscience research indicates that such “hidden hearing loss” caused by exposure to loud sounds in the early years deepens over the life span, worsening one’s hearing ability later in life.

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