Sorry to hear about your sudden hearing loss. In my un-expert opinion your not going to get much help from an ENT. By all means seek treatment to rule out anything serious (tumor ect). I’ve been traveling down this road for the last couple of years and my experience is that once all obvious causes are ruled out your are left with a diagnosis of idiosyncratic hearing loss which simply means they don’t know what causes it. Prednisone is the default treatment either orally or via injections. I have yet to find a study that shows this treatment is truly effective. I was told by an expert at MEE that their is no evidence that the injections are any more effective than the oral meds. Studies I have read indicate 50% of the people affected recover some hearing anyway. The goal of the prednisone is to reduce inflamation. I believe the underlying thought is that something is inflaming your hearing nerve causing the loss of hearing. There are also fluid mechanics involved in the inner ear and I’ve had one ENT suggest a link between salt intake and hearing loss. Fluid retention in the ear nerve affects its function. I’m fortunate that after eposodes of diminished hearing it returns. It’s a constant guessing game as to cause and effect or even if there is one. I’m a fan of the work done by Dr. Alesso Fasano and suggest reading his book Gluten Freedom. I’ve just completed a year of being gluten free and while it has not resolved all of my hearing related issues I’m convinced there is a connection between the inflamation in my inner ear and what I eat. Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of dealing with this is the lack of readily available testing to explain to me exactly what is not working with my ear. My experience has been once the routine testing is done that is available at most ENT’s you will be told there is nothing further that can be done and directed to visit an audiologist for hearing aids. While knowing the root cause of the loss does not mean it can be fixed I do think it would go a long way towards finding a “cure” as opposed to treating the symptom with a hearing aid. Good luck with your recovery!
Thanks for the info. I really appreciated. Its been really difficult the last few days but I’m hoping the treatments Will help recover some of the hearing in my leff ear. Cant believe how fast this happened
True. I try to direct my patients towards injections to avoid the potential side effects of the oral steroids. But neither of them have concrete support. Both of them have a reasonable theoretical basis.
Unfortunately, we cannot go into the ear to see what caused the problem without causing more damage. It sucks to have no answer as to what exactly causes sudden loss, but that is usually the outcome.
But to ed: Whether or not your hearing comes back in that ear, you will be okay. If it doesn’t come back it will certainly be a change in your life that will necessitate some adaptation, some management, some grieving, some gathering of your support network. But you’ll be okay.
@ed_78 any news since Sep 9?
I experienced sshl in left ear in Oct 2014, and yes it is sudden and very scary. I had the intratympanic injections, series of 3, then 6 weeks later repeat series of 3. Hearing loss was permanent. 3 weeks back I went through the same sudden hearing loss with the right ear. That happened 4 days after my hearing aid for my left ear broke.
So here I sit, not hearing much at all, and waiting for my appt at CostCo to get a pair of hearing aids.