About 10 days ago I woke up one morning with a completely blocked left ear and very annoying tinnitus.
I went to see an ENT doctor the next day: a few hearing tests led him to diagnose sudden sensorineural hearing loss (突発性難聴 とっぱつせいなんちょう toppatsusei nanchō). He gave me medication for a week (steroids and other products). Unfortunately, they did not improve my hearing.
I went back to see the doctor. I was given the same medication (without steroids this time, which I read was completely normal), along with some information about intratympanic steroid injections in case the treatment continued to be ineffective. (will give an upgrade next week).
​
A bit of context: I have a fairly solitary existence (with my wife) in a remote mountain village, and I no longer need to work. I think it takes some of the stress out of this situation.
But for ten days, I hardly watch Netflix or YouTube, I no longer listen to music, but I listen to podcasts with the sound sent only to my right ear. And I don’t yet feel ready to use Skype to chat with my son and his family. However, I read a lot more than before…
​
Although I am generally quite optimistic about my health, I wonder if a cure is possible and begin to look for strategies for living with permanent hearing loss. That’s why I would like to know if any of the redditors have ever faced the same sudden disability and how they were able to adapt to life in Japan.
16 comments
Have you gotten a second opinion? For something that effects your life so much, I wouldn’t rely on only one doctor’s opinion, especially if the medicine they prescribed didn’t work.
OP, if the steroids didn’t clear it up you really need an MRI to make sure it’s not a problem in your brain. It depends what the cause is as to whether it will heal or not but the doctor absolutely needed to also rule out a stroke/brain lesion depending on your age. That was a mistake on his part so please either go back and ask for one or see a different specialist as well just to be sure.
Obviously, I agree with other people that you should get a second opinion. My Japanese BIL had suddenly deafness which actually ended up being a brain tumor.
His left ear is still deaf and according to my husband, he actually could apply for disability because he is fully deaf in one ear.
I dunno, I would get an MRI just in case.
Agree with others, get a second opinion, there could be an underlying condition. MRI to be sure.
Scary stuff if it only came suddenly. Curious to know, what would you attribute the potential hearing loss to? (age, genetics, line of work etc.)
I agree with others that you should request an MRI. One-sided hearing loss is uncommon and one possible cause is a benign tumor called acoustic neuroma. It’s not life threatening but it can be treated with surgery and hearing can be restored. I’m in a similar situation. Steroid treatment hasn’t worked and an MRI is the next step. In any case, good luck!
Deaf bloke here!
I mentored a chap here in the UK, I met him during a social gathering 3 years post sudden loss of hearing caused by a virus, I believe.
He woke up one morning and had lost his hearing in both ears.. this impacted him dramatically. He folded his business and had 6 guys working for him, and then eventually, his marriage broke down because he refused to accept his deafness as his new reality.
He was in his 40s, and he was brought along by his mum, who was desperate to find a solution for her son. Initially, I chatted to him via text, and his lip reading skills were very good, I got him enrolled on a sign language course.. two years later, he decided to fire up his plumbing firm again, but this time, he would use other techniques he had learnt from me and others to communicate with his customers.
If there are any deaf services in your area, be sure to check them out. They will have aids that may assist you, I have a smoke detector which vibrates my pillow in case of an alarm, and my door bell, has a strobe light on it so I know someone has pressed the bell.. there’s all sorts of gadgets that may help you..
I can’t really talk about sudden loss of hearing myself as I was born profoundly deaf from birth.
But from mentoring this chap, I met.. it seems to be helll of an adjustment.
Any other questions I’ll be happy to help.
All the best mate. 👍
Just to add, I know of some people who had success with a cochlear implant, that may be something to talk about with your audiologist.
I agree with getting a second opinion.
Still something that might give you some hope: A close relative lost his hearing over the years until it was down to 10%. Communication was difficult also with hearing aid. Finally got a cochlea implantat – look it up. Its quite amazing. now phonecalls are even possible again. He became kind of a cyborg. (:
it helped that he kept working in a profession that needed a lot of listening, so the brain was able to adapt quite quickly.
Repeating what everyone said here! Get a second opinion! I lost part of my hearing when a pulled some muscles in my back before. It got totally better though. This could be totally curable or it could be something more nefarious. Please go to another doctor.
OP do you have wax build up issues? Cause I do and when I first experienced this I went to the ear doc and he prescribed me some type of strong oil drops to administer daily for a week. Went back and she flushed my ears with a water syringe and a lot of crap came out. My hearing came back. Now I have to do this at least once a year because my doc told me that my ear canal entrance is very small and so wax has a hard time getting out. Before going to her i told her i tried taking some medicinal drops but she told me that anything but getting my ear canal cleaned would have been useless.
Like others said get a second opinion.
My husband had this happen a few years ago. He is still deaf on that ear but has mostly adapted.
But yeah, seconding the MRI, it’s essential to make sure it’s not a tumor. The wait for hubby’s MRI was brutal, for both us, just because it’s apparently a quite common reason. Fingers crossed for you, hubby’s final diagnosis was atypical Morbus Meniere, so he didn’t need surgery but it’s a condition that’ll likely worsen in the future. I also had a colleague with sudden hearing loss and it took six months of trying various things and eventually giving up until it finally one day all of a sudden came back.
Outside of seeking additional opinions.
Hearing loss in one ear isn’t the end-all be all. You still do have your other ear after all. Between hearing loss and blindness, I always like to think hearing loss is the better end of the stick.
You can inquire if hearing aids would work in your situation though these can be very expensive.
You can watch netflix and youtube. Subititles are your friends. Why can’t you listen to music? You still have a perfectly good ear right?
Why can’t you skype with your friends and family?
Enter the hard-ass:
You have one good ear and one ear that is losing hearing for whatever reason. You *can* still hear and talk. You aren’t bilaterally deaf. It seems like you are intentionally going out of your way to throw yourself a pity party and truthfully you need to stop that IMMEDIATELY. You’re not doing yourself or anyone around you any favors and it’s unnecessary. It’s fine to be upset for a few days but it’s over 10 with seemingly no end in sight.
I’m sure it’s different, scary, hard. But loss of hearing in one ear truthfully does not make you unable to talk to your son/family over skype! Nor prevent you from doing anything you could do before. Talk to your family dude, Get earbuds and put it directly in your good ear and turn up the volume if needed. Explain to them that you are having trouble with your hearing and for them to repeat anything you miss.
Go back to enjoying your music and videos. Turn on subtitles, put headphones in on the good year. No more pity parties. Get the second opinion and MRI. See about a hearing aid and if the first opinion is correct. But there’s no need for the loss of watching videos/listening to music and the discontinuation of talking to your son.
Thank you very much to everyone who responded to my message.
Regarding your advice, I think it was stupid of me to not write down that I was planning to ask for an MRI next time. And of course, if denied, I will visit another doctor.
It could be a brain lesion / tumor, or Vestibular Schwannoma / Acoustic Neuroma, and usually leads to a sudden onset of hearing loss with tinnitus. Many doctors discount this until much later in the diagnosis. Hopefully it is nothing of the such, but please look into this, so it can be discounted.
Get the MRI but be careful, those are super loud inside, take some earplugs as sometimes they don’t provide them on spot..learn how to use earplugs before the session..you don’t want to further damage hearing !. The best MRI machines in terms of loudness are made by Toshiba/Cannon medical as they have patented some hardware improvements to make it less loud.
Steroids have a very short window of effectiveness , I keep some at home just in case of something like that happening at home, the drug is called Prednisone you can get it in Japan outside insurance plans as they only prescribe tiny amounts orally with insurance, . which have no real therapeutic effect, that is probably why it did not do anything for you, usually they give 40mg or even less per day, but in Germany they did human studies and you need at least 250mg IV to get enough supply of steroids into the cochlea.
The best for your case is to get a steroid shot into the ear ASAP, it may still help, always worth a try but don’t wait. You can work on the MRI exam later, based on your symptoms its sudden hearing loss and only steroids will do something, at the early stage
How much steroid did they give you in mg per day ?
If the tinnitus ever gets to be too annoying and you just need a few minutes rest from it, put your hands over your ears and gently drum the back of your skull with your fingers for 30s.
It helps me to know it’s in my power to stop it, even though I’ve mostly gotten used to it. I read this on one reddit post and no idea why it isn’t more commonly cited.
For whatever it’s worth my MRI was negative, but I never had complete hearing loss and mine was symmetric mostly.
I’m going through this right now, you should go to a hospital right away. If the oral steroids aren’t working you should be getting steroid injections directly into your ear. I also recommend looking for a hospital with hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT/高気圧酸素治療). You can find a list of hospitals with this treatment easily online, so hopefully there is one near you.
You have one month to see improvement and then it’s most likely permanent. I was having trouble getting improvement until I started HBOT and got about 10 sessions in. I’m likely to remain partially deaf in one ear, but at least it went from severe to moderate, and getting closer to mild in some frequencies.
Don’t rush the MRI, if it’s a tumor, the damage is done and there’s nothing you can do. Focus on the other available treatments first and then try to get an MRI around it.
Seriously go to a hospital right away, time is of the essence and you are already 10 days in.
Also, did you have COVID recently? My doctor was saying there’s been a huge spike in SSNHL since the pandemic started and it’s believed to be related, even though there’s a 90% chance you’ll never know the cause.
Good luck!