When it comes to your hearing, the last thing you want is to become a statistic for hearing loss. There are certain steps each one of us can take to protect our hearing, even as we age. I was recently watching a science channel on directv in Tennessee while vacationing in the mountains, and I learned a lot about hearing loss and its causes. Some of them are inevitable for certain people, but nearly all of them can be watched for and treated if caught early.

Audiologists began In the 1980s cautioning those who love loud music about hearing loss that could result from use of their Walkman or portable compact disc (CD) players. Now, in an age when iPods are the hot holiday gift for music lovers of all ages, many experts are encouraging more careful use of the popular music listening devices.

Could there be a link between dementia and hearing loss? US researchers at Johns Hopkins Hospital administered hearing tests to a group of 640 subjects, aged 36 to 90, all dementia-free between 1990 and 1994. They followed these subjects until 2008, recording instances of the development of dementia.

Senior citizens often ignore signs of hearing loss, particularly when those signs come on gradually and are less noticeable. Presbycusis, one form of gradual hearing loss, occurs with age. Presbycusis can be triggered by changes in the inner ear, auditory nerve, middle ear or the outer ear. Some of its ordinary causes are aging, loud noise, heredity, head injury, infection, illness, certain prescription drugs and circulation problems such as high blood pressure. It also seems to have a genetic connection, as it is frequently inherited.

Experts report over 50 million Americans experience tinnitus, an often debilitating condition of the inner ear that causes the sufferer to hear a constant ringing or buzzing sound. About 12 million have tinnitus terrible enough to seek medical attention, while roughly 2 million patients are so debilitated by tinnitus they cannot function at a normal level on a daily basis, or sleep enough to keep themselves sane. Chances are that someone you know, perhaps a family member or friend, may suffer from this disorder while being too embarrassed to discuss it.

Tinnitus, a disease characterized by the sound of buzzing or ringing in the ears, or a constant, high pitched emission of sound, affects millions of Americans each year. The typical causes of tinnitus are conditions like inner ear damage, wax build-up in the ears, age related hearing loss or changes, or high blood pressure. But a number of medications may also cause, or can worsen, tinnitus. Many people do not realize that the medications they take could be contributing to their tinnitus condition, and unless these medications are reported to doctors during an examination to find the cause of the tinnitus, they can be overlooked. In addition, the higher the dose of medication, the worse the tinnitus generally becomes. In many cases, the unwanted noise disappears completely when a patient stops using the suspect drugs.