Hearing Health
Hearing Health Guide
LSTN Editorial Team · Editorially overseen by Dan McCoy
Plain-English guides and definitions to help you understand your hearing before your first appointment — covering hearing loss, audiograms, finding the right provider, and what to expect. Editorially overseen by someone who spent seven years working inside the audiology industry.
Guides
Long-form articles on understanding, testing, and managing hearing health.
Why You Can Hear But Can't Understand People
Why speech clarity declines even when volume seems fine — and what it means for your hearing.
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AwarenessSigns Your Hearing Is Getting Worse
The early signs most people miss, and how to know whether what you're experiencing is normal aging or hearing loss.
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AwarenessAge-Related Hearing Loss After 50
What presbycusis is, why it happens, and what's within the normal range as you get older.
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AwarenessNoise-Induced Hearing Loss: How Everyday Sounds Add Up
How repeated exposure to loud environments causes permanent damage — and what you can do about it.
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AwarenessTinnitus and Hearing Loss: What's the Connection?
Why ringing in the ears and hearing loss often occur together, and what each tells you about the other.
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AwarenessMedications That Can Damage Your Hearing
A plain-English guide to ototoxic drugs — what they are, which ones carry risk, and what to ask your doctor.
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ToolsHow to Take an Online Hearing Test and Trust the Results
What to do before you start, what the test actually measures, and how to interpret what you get.
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ToolsHow to Read an Audiogram: A Plain-English Guide
What the axes mean, how to find your hearing thresholds, and what your results actually say about your hearing.
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Finding CareAudiologist vs Hearing Instrument Specialist: Which Do You Need?
The real differences in training and scope — and how to decide which type of provider is right for your situation.
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Finding CareWhat Happens at Your First Audiology Appointment
A step-by-step walkthrough so you know what to expect, what to bring, and what questions to ask.
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Finding CareOTC vs Prescription Hearing Aids: What the Research Says
Who OTC aids are right for, where they fall short, and how to decide without a sales pitch.
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Living With ItHow to Communicate With Someone Who Has Hearing Loss
Practical strategies for family members, partners, and coworkers — not platitudes, but things that actually help.
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Glossary of Terms
Plain-English definitions of the terms you encounter when dealing with hearing loss, audiograms, and hearing care.
Tinnitus
Tinnitus is the perception of sound without an external audio source, most commonly ringing, buzzing, or hissing. It affects an estimated 15% of adults in the United States.
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Sensorineural Hearing Loss
Sensorineural hearing loss is the most common form of permanent hearing loss, caused by damage to the hair cells of the inner ear (cochlea) or the auditory nerve pathway.
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Conductive Hearing Loss
Conductive hearing loss occurs when sound is blocked or weakened before it reaches the inner ear, typically due to a problem in the outer or middle ear.
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Speech-in-Noise Difficulty
Speech-in-noise difficulty is the inability to understand speech clearly when background noise is present. It is one of the most common and earliest signs that hearing is changing.
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Pure-Tone Average (PTA)
A pure-tone average (PTA) is a single number representing your average hearing threshold at the speech frequencies most important for understanding conversation, typically 500 Hz, 1,000 Hz, and 2,000 Hz.
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Hearing Threshold
Your hearing threshold is the quietest sound you can detect at a given frequency, measured in decibels hearing level (dB HL). It is the fundamental measurement of any hearing test.
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