Tinnitus (ringing In Ears)

[Guest heli206212]

Ground res,

 

You have done your research. The ringing will start in 1 ear and then to both over time. I blame the Turbines, that's life. I do evrything to prevent any hearing damage. You can purchase custom ear plugs, vented and non-vented. CEP addition to your helmet. Helmet. It all helps.

 

I have custom ear plugs to wear to movies, hockey games, lawn mower, and etc. I keep the volume on the low side, whenever I can.

 

You have to be very aware of your surrounding and how this will effect your hearing. Once lost, it is gone. A doctor did tell me that there is a study of medication to stop the ringing, but in trail phase.

 

As long as you prevent any more loss, you will fly till your are old and grey. It is common it adults, so do not worry about your health. I am in my mid-thirties and have had this problem for about 3 years now, most time I forget I have it. A month later I haer the ringing and it reminds me. My advice, try not to think about it and you will not hear it. I know it might be easier said than done.

 

The most important thing is to prevent any more hearing loss. What is done is done.

 

oh yes, the ANR is a no no. As stated above, it causes more damage to your hearing. Google it, and you will be surprised. I had one and got rid of it.

 

Fly safe.

[Skids Up]

My Mom had it develop at around age 50'ish. No turbines or loud concerts to get it started with her.

Maybe from yelling at us kids for so long....

 

 

It may be hereditary, I started with it around the same age bracket and it seems to come and go.

 

Usually when it is quiet it is most noticeable, but has stayed totally livable throughout the time I've noticed it.

[Cole]

There are much better systems out there then anr, ANR in specific is not hearing protection as it doesnt reduce the noise going into your ears. In fact the opposite is true it introduces MORE energy into the ear canal and therefor does more harm then good. if you ever have a pair of speakers you dont care about to much try hooking up a mono input into a sterio and hooking one speaker up backwards following this by crankin up the volume... if you stand half way between the speakers at the perfect spot you will lose the music, you can still feel the vibration, but no sound. This is in fact what ANR does inside your ears based on a microphone that picks up the harmful frequencies and introduces contradictory frequencies. You no longer hear the undertones but they are still harming you.

 

There are now products much like the earphones shown abouve for helmets with in ear speakers and gel/silicone insets that are hardwired so when plugged in (theyre removeable for doors on low noise ops) when you turn up the comms volume it simply turns down the ambient noise.

 

The noise level should be relatively harmless below 35db provided its within apprx 40-20000ohms but it is important to hear some of the aircraft in the background.

 

Easiest quick fix- the little orange ear plugs should restrict all volume to 30db so wear those and turn up the volume a bit.

 

Play the drums long enough and you learn a few tricks haha.

[06HeliMAN]

There are much better systems out there then anr, ANR in specific is not hearing protection as it doesnt reduce the noise going into your ears. In fact the opposite is true it introduces MORE energy into the ear canal and therefor does more harm then good. You no longer hear the undertones but they are still harming you.

 

WHAT IN THE WORLD!!! Bose should have informed me of this in the instruction manuel. I thought ANR headsets were good protected your hears.

[Groundresonance]

Groundresonance,

This may sound a little out there BUT are you taking/using any type of Herbal Drugs? such as Ginseng.

 

pc12dude,

 

I am not taking any herbal medication, but am open to trying alternative medicine. I've noticed a multitude of herbal remedies online. A number of people have also suggested I try acupuncture. I don't have any illusions that there is a cure for tinnitus, but it sounds like some of these alternatives may provide some relief.

 

To Everyone Who Responded:

 

Thank you so much for your input. It makes me feel better to know that I am not alone with this condition and that you all have learned to cope with it in your own way and continue enjoying life. I tend to let my mind run away with negative thoughts when it comes to things like this, so it helps to have a reality check with others who have experienced the same thing. I'll just continue to wear earplugs, but will turn the ANR off (that news was pretty depressing). I'll also keep my eyes out for someone to invent an earplug that muffles the high-frequency turbine noise.

 

Thanks!

 

Groundresonance

[Skidz]

WHAT IN THE WORLD!!! Bose should have informed me of this in the instruction manuel. I thought ANR headsets were good protected your hears.

 

Actually, ANR doesn't do more damage to your ears, as some detractors claim. It doesn't protect them either. All ANR does is reduce the stress and fatigue caused by noise.

 

My uncle is an acoustics engineer and studies have shown that white noise, employed in ANR, doesn't cause more damage to the ears than the ambient noise it is cancelling.

 

For example, if you're working in a 94dB environment and using ANR, your ears will continue to receive 94dB of sound. Where ANR will slightly reduce damage is in the attenuation of very high and very low frequencies.

 

There are basically two areas of your ear that get damaged by sound: Your eardrums (outer ear) are more sensitive to pressure generated by sound (volume) and your inner ear is more sensitive to highs and lows. So, ANR does nothing to protect your eardrums, but it does offer a certain measure of protection to your inner ear. Your inner ear gets damaged by excessive vibration. White noise emits inverse frequencies to ambient noise and thus prevents the small bones in the inner ear from vibrating, which is why you don't hear the sounds.

 

Imagine thae lawsuits for all those companies manufacturing white noise systems if it was damaging to hearing ! I worked on an IBM campus where about 3000 people worked and every room of every building had white noise systems... :shock:

 

As for Cole's comment on reversing two speakers on a sound system, this is the best way to see if your speakers are well balanced. You put both of them about 6 inches apart face to face, reverse the polarity on one of them, set the receiver to mono, and let 'er rip ! This will do no damage whatsoever to the speakers, as long as you keep the volume within reasonable limits. With the volume fairly high, you should hardly hear anything coming from the speakers. The fainter the sound, the better balanced your speakers are. If one speaker cable is as little as 6 inches shorter than the other, you will see a noticeable difference. Put your hand between the speakers and the sound will change as the sound waves bounce off your hand and you will feel the sound pressure.

[TREE]

Sorry, here is a new link to the custom ER-25 earplug info.

 

Old link stopped working.

 

http://tinyurl.com/2e4m8v

[06HeliMAN]

Actually, ANR doesn't do more damage to your ears, as some detractors claim. It doesn't protect them either. All ANR does is reduce the stress and fatigue caused by noise.

 

That's an interesting fact. When selecting a headset one should look for one that has both good passive NR and active NR then correct? Bose has fairly good passive NR, but not as much as some of the other brands. Bose's active NR however is superb. Is the noise level high enough were I should wear earplugs along with the Bose X in the R44s and R22s? No age is a good age to lose hearing, but even more so at such a young age like me.

[pc12dude]

So...Cole, are you saying that IF we are using ANR head gear we are hurting our ears.

If this is true Im thinking the big head-set companies have some splaning to do.

[pc12dude]

Grndres,

couple years ago I started to get alot of ringing in my ears (scared the #### out of me), went to the doc, He asked what kind of meds I was on. I told him about some herbal stuff I was taking. He told me to quit whatever I was taking and if the ringing did not stop, come back. the ringing stopped.

No more herbal stuff for me.