Hearing Loss Reversed by Teeth

When a patient is totally deaf in just one ear (normal hearing on the other side), there are only a few options to help.

• BAHA - Bone Anchored Hearing Aid
• CROS Hearing Aid - Stands for Contralateral Routing Of Signals.

With BAHA, it does require surgery given the hearing aid is literally mounted on a post that is directly drilled into the skull on the deaf ear side. Total cost about $10,000.

With CROS, two hearing aids are required; one on the deaf hear which picks up sound, and another on the good ear where the sound is transmitted to. Total cost about $2,500.

Well, for many folks, having surgery is not palatable and wearing two hearing aids when one ear is perfectly good is also not acceptable.

There's now a third option called SoundBite (cost about $6,800).

With SoundBite, a hearing aid is placed in the deaf ear to pick up sound which is than wirelessly transmitted to a mini-retainer like device placed around the back molars. This special retainer vibrates the teeth which in turn vibrates the skull which sends sound waves to the good ear allowing a patient to hear.

And preliminary results show that patients like it the best among the three options.

However, nothing is all good...

The disadvantage with the SoundBite is battery life. The ear piece battery only lasts about 12-15 hours and the teeth retainer piece about 8 hours. Also, the teeth retainer needs to be fitted by a dentist.

Also, not everybody is a candidate for SoundBite. In order to quality, a patient must have:

1) Good teeth and gums
2) Deaf in only one side with normal hearing on the other. A comprehensive hearing test is required obviously.

Source:

Using Teeth to Help Restore Hearing in One Ear. WSJ 7/10/12

Why Does My Voice Sound Different on Recording and Treatment Options

Every so often, I have a patient who presents to my office with a complaint that their voice sounds different on recording than what they themselves hear.

In particular, singers who come in state specifically that their vocal recordings sounds slightly flat when they thought they were singing in perfect pitch.

So why does this happen? Unfortunately, it is physics and fundamentally integrated to how the ear, skull, and sound transmission work. In other words, it can't be "treated" with surgery or medications.

What other people hear when you sing or talk is air conducted sound that gets transmitted through the ear canal, eardrum, middle ear bones, and ultimately to the cochlea hearing organ (pathway A). Image modified from Wikipedia.

The sound the individual singer/talker hears is not only sound transmitted via the air (pathway A) but also by vibration of the skull itself directly to the cochlea hearing organ bypassing the outer and middle ear completely (pathway B). The mechanical properties of the skull enhance the deeper, lower-frequency vibrations.

Therefore, when a talker/singer listens to a recording of their voice speaking/singing, the bone-conducted pathway that they consider part of their “normal” voice is eliminated, and they hear only the air-conducted component in unfamiliar isolation (what everybody else actually hears).

SO... what is a singer/talker to do if they are disturbed by the way they sound to others? Particularly, what is a singer to do when they always sing a little flat when they truly think they are singing in pitch?

One can wear earplugs in order to hear only bone-conducted vibrations and get used to their alter-voice and undergo speech/voice therapy. OR... accept that their voice IS different.

For singers, I highly recommend using HearFones Headsetwhich is a funny looking head device that allows an individual singer to hear what they really sound like and more importantly what the audience would hear! In addition, while using HearFones, the singer would be able to hear himself more predominantly over the rest of the ensemble thus helping him to improve the quality of his/her individual vocal quality output.

Over time, singers will be able to automatically adjust their singing such that they no longer will need such a device to sing in tune with others when in familiar surroundings. BUT... in new environments (new concert hall, outdoor arena, etc), it is not unusual that their singing may become off again...

This is why professional singers often wear earpieces that convey sounds recorded by microphones placed in the audience... and also why they sometimes sound flat and out-of-tune when they don't!

It's also why it is VERY important to rehearse in a new place before a concert.

Stabbing Headaches??? Maybe It's A Knife in the Head...

At least it was for one patient who suffered stabbing headaches for 4 years after being mugged... and another due to a nailgun accident who complained mainly of a toothache...

As unbelievable as it sounds, neither patients realized they had a knife/nail in their head until an x-ray was done showing the culprit.

Read more in the LA Times story here.

Read the MSNBC story here.