I've had so many horrendous side effects from trying hearing aids in my sensitive ear, which started when I started wearing a second hearing aid, but nobody for 2 years told me anything about recruitment or hyperacusis.
Hyperacusis is an extreme noise sensitivity, while recruitment is the same except that those people have a hearing loss. ENT's, Audioglists will never mention HYP to you, but if you go the
www.hyperacusis.net you will read so much information.
Hyperacusis is nothing like Tinnitus, for me it started when from the time I word a second hearing aid all the cars that went by sounded more like 747 Jet Engines, and I couldn't bear the noise. I complained every two weeks for two whole years, to my hearing dealer and a teaching hopital, that was between 96 and 98. Over 40 drugs actually cause hyperacusis, my doctor knew that and told me she knew after I found this information out and spent eight years trying to educate her about what Hyperacusis was.
One time at the teaching hospital (about 97) one young audiolgoist told me it was normal for me to feel like I was going to faint and vomit from the noise everyday. ENT's see people who are sensitive to noises everyday, but they aren't allowed to say anything, because most of the time the cause is drugs, flu shots and sometimes a car crash or extreme loud noise wearing powerful hearing aids, but no audilogist will ever admit that until you can't even see straight, have barely any memory left and suffer from horrendous migraines.
I can only wear one hearing aid, yet I have a 65% loss in both ears. If I don't wear my hearing aids I'am much more startled by loud noises and still dizzy and disoriented. They only test the soft sounds that you can hear, and not the loud sounds, many audiolgists don't even know how but won't admit this.
When I complained to the Teaching Hospital in Toronto in 2002, I was lead into a room with two Tinnitus and Hyperacusis Specialists (and most of the time they're only taken a two-hour course) who were both University students, and the girl was startled that I was jumping up and down during the hearing test. Then they showed me my file, and written in 1996 was:
"Suffers from severe recruitment and hyperacusis", I was floored, and then they handed by a brochure about hyperacusis, one that took me about eight years to gather that information.
So from 96-98, I walked around thinking I was wacko with strange headaches and adjusting the volume 75 times a day, whereas before that I never touched the volume once. You can have the same hearing loss in both ears like I do, but still hear 10 times more in one ear, because they only test the soft sounds you hear, not the loud sounds.
In trying other hearing aids for my sensitive ear, I got Bell's Palsy for a while after trying one for 1.5 days.
With another hearing aid, that only amplified soft sounds and no loud ones for 1/2 days I felt like a bleached whale and could barely get out of bed for 5 days, and couldn't even walk straight.
With the recent one I got I only wore it for 4 days, and only kept it because it took away my migraines. It's makes the left side of my body very nauseus.
Hearing dealers still want me to hear and try this and that, yet at the same time I'am the only HOH person in my family so they think I need to be yelled at because I don't hear properly even with hearing aids, and they talk with funny bowling lips which triggers the trigeminal nerve, so they can't handle living with me, and we get into plenty of arguments because they refuse to listen to me and what I'am telling and showing and educating them about.
I'am 38, and their in their late 60's. The family feels they all need to yell at me, even though I've been telling them for 10 years now I'am sensitive to loud noises, so guess who's the slow learner??
ENT's all over the world everyday do experiments with noise intolerance on animals, yet the research they do is funded and certain procedures are taken.
Animals can't talk, and ENT's haven't done the research to realize that many people nowadays hear more than what their chart specifies, and many people are sensitive to noises, it's also an electrical sensitivity, and related to environmental illnesses, such as MCS (multiple chemcial sensitivity).
I've had 10 years of research and living from this so I know. A simple white noise machine at Sears, or Zellers really helps, it's a mere $38 bucks but nobody will ever tell you this.
I hear great when I'am listening to headsets, even with the volume up, but it's also been 10 years since my flu shot, I always keep homeopathic kits in the washroom for colds and flus.
I used to go the hospitals and the Cdn. Hearing Society and talk to doctors about reaching people who were walking around in a total daze like I was for the first four years, I didn't know anything about hyperacusis until 1999 but that's when I finally started solving the puzzle. With doctor's and patients there's a client confidentiality, so they can't by law help out patients with other patients, and that's why the internet is so wonderful.
Bias/Propoganda? Yup! The State Medical System is your choice if you choose to be sick, or your other choice is to educate yourself and pay for
Traditional and Ancient Systems that have known more about the body connections for 5000 years.
What helps ringing in the ear? A white noise machine!
you can google white noise, or visit
www.biowaves.com, or google sound therapy!
Take it easy!, visit the board sometime.
By the way, the Bernafon I had, I had the phone switch connected to it, and I LOVED it, because it only helped me to hear voices at a comfortable volume, and no background noise ...........BUT.............it intensely amplified any and all electrical noises, it was zapping when I was 1 foot away from a computer.
The ear has 12,500 different cochlear hair cells, all pick up different tones, pitches, fq's..........the audilogy machine can't pinpoint which hair you have are barely alive and sounds that are amplifies can kill that hair cell.
If you have Deaf people in the family and know sign and go through this procedure, it's easy to not wear the hearing aids, as I know someone who's 21 and tried two hearing aids, but the noises zapped her braincells and she just only wore them for four days, her parents are Deaf so it's very different with HOH and Deaf people and the seperation is so huge!
Okay so lately my ears have been ringing constantly with my new siemen aids id ont think there the aids i dont know what to do my head is killin me from this. i cant take the pain anymore. my audiologist is on a vacation this so sucks. Does anyone know if EAR DROPS would help? let me know....i have suffered all my life and now that im much older i cant take it no more!!!!!!
i use my hearing aid whenever it becomes severe enuf to the point where i just simply CANNOT stand it and i would have some other noises going like TV volume up and etc to try and drown out the ringing in my ear -- it ONLY occurs in my left ear not in my right oddly -- never have that problem with my right ear ringing 
