Hi there. I had a head injury about 5 weeks ago and lost about 75% to
80% hearing in my right ear. The ENT doc told me the hearing loss was
conductive hearing loss instead of hearing loss caused by damage to the
nervous system. He said that it would not be a big deal to have surgery
and fix the ossicle bones (where he thinks the problem is). I am
leaning towards waiting about a year or so to see if the problem
resolves itself (based on info obtained from someone else under similar
circumstances and from a book on hearing loss) instead of going under
the knife now. What I'd like to know is will waiting a year or so hurt
the nerve cells since the amount of hearing stimulation they are getting
in that ear is quite low ("use it or lose it")? Or should I get the
bones fixed now so that the nerve cells get lots more stimulation and
thus not die in a year or so? When I pick up the phone and listen to
the dial tone in the bad ear, I can barely hear it (loudness intensity
is about 20% of the other ear) so there is a little bit reaching the
nerves in that ear but not much. Anyway *any* input at all on this
would really be appreciated. Thanks so much!
Bill