Happy New Ears! 10 Resolutions for Healthy Hearing in the New Year

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Well, with the Christmas wrapping up nothing but burnt cinders in the fireplace, and the needles dropping off the tree, it’s time to turn our attention to a new year. 2009 is a year of opportunity – your opportunity to not only protect your hearing health, but to improve it, as well.

So here are Healthy Hearing’s 2009 “New Ear’s Resolutions” to protect your hearing and improve your quality of life. And, hey, these are resolutions that are easier to keep than losing some excess poundage so jump in and listen up. You’re gonna like what you hear this year.

Healthy Hearing’s Second Annual New Ear’s Resolutions

1. Get HAPPY™. Very cool and easy to do. HAPPY™ is Healthy Hearing’s hearing test tools to create a Hearing Aid Personalized Profile for You, thus get HAPPY™.

Simply log on to Healthy Hearing (www.HealthyHearing.com) and look for the “get HAPPY™” link on the homepage or access under the Consumer Guide section. Answer a few simple questions about yourself, your hearing problems and your hearing goals. Once completed, you will receive a personalized recommendations based on your specific type and extent of hearing loss. How easy is that? But wait, there’s more.

HAPPY™ will provide you comprehensive guides and articles based on your needs, as well as point you in the direction of local hearing care professionals in your area, making a visit to the ear store as easy as a click. Hey, you’ll even receive a comprehensive financing and funding options guide to take a little bit of the sting out of that sticker shock. (And did I mention it is free?)

Make 2009 the year you go proactive about your hearing health. Nobody’s going to do it if you don’t and, umm, isn’t it time?

2. See a hearing care professional. Bottom line getting a comprehensive hearing evaluation should be on your annual medical “to-do” list and before you can do so, you need to find a qualified hearing care professional.

Not sure where to start in finding a hearing care professional in your area? You can use Healthy Hearing’s HAPPY™ list of local hearing pros provided to you after completing the HAPPY™ or visit the Find a Professional section on Healthy Hearing (www.HealthyHearing.com). Search by city, state or zip and you will be provided a list of professionals that are conveniently located near you.

The point isn’t how you find a hearing care professional. The point is: do it. Make it a New Ear’s resolution this year and every year!

3. Be aware. Wake up and hear the music. If you’re like most carbon-based life forms, you spend some time in quiet environments and some times in loud, noisy environments. Increase your awareness of noise-induced hearing loss ‘cause, sure enough, if you travel the NASCAR circuit in your RV, every weekend you’re damaging the delicate hearing mechanisms you were born with.

If you are someone who is regularly in noisy environments, invest in a future of healthy hearing by purchasing a pair of sophisticated hearing protection devices. Isn’t your hearing worth the money?

And if you are someone who occasionally is exposed to noisy environments, wear ear protection. Any form of protection, like the inexpensive foam plugs, will do your ears some good.

This is resolution should be a no-brainer. Protect what you’ve got while you still have it.

4. Go unplugged. Addicted to your personal music player? Can’t live without the latest downloads to your iPhone or Blackberry? Well, I’ll just type a little louder so YOU GET THE MESSAGE!

In an article published on Healthy Hearing Dr. Brian J. Fligor, Sc.D., CCC-A, Director of Diagnostic Audiology at Children's Hospital in Boston and an Instructor in Otology and Laryngology at Harvard Medical School, (so he’s got the creds, right?) said this on personal music players:

“I’m not against MP3 players, I have one myself and I love it. I use it all the time.” However, as Dr. Fligor sees things, consumers are being given a “false sense of security” when they purchase so-called “safe” MP3 ear buds. “I’m skeptical of any product that relies solely on controlling volume without any recognition of the role length of listening time plays in hearing loss.”

The problem isn’t just how loud. It’s how long you listen, too. So give your ears a break, turn down the volume and unplug yourself from time to time. The real world can sound pretty good if you give it a try.

5. Stay Up-to-date. Did you know Healthy Hearing updates the latest news and information on hearing loss, hearing aids and cochlear implants daily? Make it a resolution to visit www.HealthyHearing.com weekly, monthly or whenever you are online for the latest information. And be sure to sign up for Healthy Hearing's monthly newsletter delivered to your email inbox summarizing Healthy Hearing’s hottest happenings for the month.

6. Go green, for goodness sake. It’s easy when you use Energizer and Rayovac mercury-free hearing aid batteries. So, when it’s time to swap out your old hearing aid battery for a new power plant, go green. Save the Earth. Hey, that’s a really good resolution: Save the Earth.

7. Eat Green. Eat more leafy green foods high in anti-oxidants – even if you don’t like spinach and never did. Noise trauma creates free radicals – corrosive little molecules that erode your hearing a bit at a time.

Foods like spinach (eat it raw in a salad – you won’t even notice), kale, broccoli and other green foods provide anti-oxidants that prevent those acidic free radicals from eating away at your cochlea.

8. Learn more about hearing aids. The World Wide Web and Healthy Hearing simplify searching for information on how you hear, how to protect your hearing and what hearing aids offer today’s consumer.

Studies have shown hearing aids can improve quality of life. No longer are they the big clunky beige bananas that Grandpa used to wear behind his ears. It is time for you to discover what today’s sophistaticated hearing aids have to offer you.

So before you contact a hearing care professional, become an educated consumer. Discover the latest types of hearing aids available – from completely-in-the-canal (CIC) devices to lightweight, discreet open-fit behind the ear (BTE) devices.

Learn about the latest technologies that are helping change the lives of those that have taken the step to healthy hearing by wearing hearing aids. Noise reduction, feedback cancellation, and directional microphones – are just a few of the latest in digital technologies that have improved hearing aids.

Develop a list of listening goals and priorities, and the features you want in your hearing aids (getting HAPPY™ can help you with this). Knowing what you want when you walk through the ear gear store gives you a strong buying advantage, i.e., you’ll get the right device at the right price for you.

9. Encourage those around you to have their hearing checked. Often, others are aware of a hearing loss before the individual who experiences that hearing loss. If a friend, family member, neighbor or lodge brother shows signs of hearing loss, mention it in a nice way and offer the name of your hearing care professional. Or better yet, send them this article.

You may initially offend the individual, but you will ultimately improve the quality of their life. Someday they will thank you.

10. Move it or lose it. Exercise improves circulation which, in turn, helps keep the hearing mechanism working as it should. Studies have shown aerobic exercise can increase our hearing abilities. So strap on some walking shoes and do a quarter mile the first day, walking just fast enough to elevate your heart rate and get you breathing briskly. If you’re gasping for air, you’re going too fast.

And, you can put your newly-developed fitness to good use by signing on for the Hearing Loss Association of America’s (HLAA) Walk4Hearing. This philanthropic and advocacy association’s Walk4hearing raises money for hearing health research and gives you the opportunity to strut your stuff and your super cool walking treads.

Now, go back over this list. Is there any one of those resolutions you’d find hard to keep? If your resolutions include a healthier lifestyle, (Are you really still smoking? Did you know smoking can increase your chances for hearing loss?), your hearing should be a big part of that new, improved lifestyle.

Healthy life = healthy hearing. Healthy hearing = happy life. Happy life = happy you.

May the New Year bring you health and happiness from your friends at Healthy Hearing.

HAPPY NEW EARS!!

P.S. Please don’t drink and drive over the holidays.