Hearing loss with glue ear

It's hard to know how much your child's hearing will be affected by glue ear. Some children have a lot of hearing loss, while others have only mild loss.

Doctors often use the word decibel (dB) when talking about hearing loss. Decibels are used to indicate the loudness of a sound as well as the severity of a hearing loss. Studies have shown that with glue ear, the loss of hearing can range from 0 dB to 60 dB.

• The average loss is between about 20 and 30 dB. This is normally called mild hearing loss. If your child has mild hearing loss, he or she may not hear or may hear only faintly the soft sounds at the beginnings or ends of words, such as the 's' in 'sun' and 't' in 'tin'. He or she may also have problems hearing words spoken quietly, such as 'and'.
• Some children with fluid in the ear have a hearing loss of 30 dB to 40 dB.Doctors usually think of this as moderate hearing loss. If your child has moderate hearing loss, he or she may have trouble hearing most speech sounds as well as short, softly spoken words and word endings. A normal conversation may sound like a soft whisper.
• As a rule of thumb, if your child keeps having a hearing loss of more than 25 dB, it is considered important. Your child may need treatment. However, even smaller hearing losses (20 dB or 15 dB) could prevent some children from hearing properly.
• If your child has glue ear, his or her hearing may change from day to day. Your child may even have periods of normal hearing.
• Children who have fluid in only one ear will be able to hear better than those who have fluid in both ears, because the healthy ear hears normally. If your child has fluid in only one ear, your doctor will probably not recommend treatment.
• How long your child has hearing loss depends on how long his or her ears are filled with fluid. Once the fluid has cleared, with or without treatment, his or her hearing will go back to normal. But if your child has glue ear constantly, or if it keeps coming back, they could spend much of the first two years of their life not being able to hear properly.

It's important to remember that hearing loss in a child can sometimes have other causes. For example, the inner ear can become inflamed because of an ear infection or an injury. Inflammation is one of the ways the body responds to injury. It can cause swelling, pain, redness and warmth. Inflammation in the ear can lead to hearing loss because it affects the nerves that carry messages to the brain. If you are concerned about other causes of hearing loss, discuss them with your doctor.

frome:www.guardian.co.uk