The simple answer is, yes, if listening to them at unsafe levels.
The risk of inner ear damage, resulting in eventual hearing loss, is quite high for those with prolonged exposure to noise. One statistic stated that teens today are 1 in 5 for having some level of hearing loss, a rate 30% higher than that of teens 20 years ago. The reason being, many experts are stating as, increased use of personal listening devices and headphones.
Parents, teens, music lovers, if you cherish your hearing, think about following some simple guidelines to protect your hearing:
Here are some tips to teach your teen to reduce the risk of Noise-Induced Hearing Loss from the use of earphones:
Reduce the volume - keep the volume level below 80- there is an Iphone app that monitors your noise intake in the Health section
Lessen the duration - don’t spend 6 hours listening to music, listen for a while and take sound and noise breaks.
Pick the right headphones, ones with a volume adjustment may be important. Try not to buy earphones that exceed 85 dB, anything over 85dB can be harmful over time.
Clean your earphones/headphones, bacteria and infection can occur from dirty listening devices that come in contact with your skin.
Clean your ears regularly. Although ears have “earwax” or Cerumen which helps with the natural cleaning process of the ears, “plugging up your ears” often may cause excessive wax build-up which could create additional issues.
Get your hearing tested to determine a baseline and then have annual or every 2 years follow-up hearing tests.
Protect your ears, when not listening to earphones and in noisy environments. Use some hearing protection.
Radha Joy, Leader in Hearing Conservation and founder of Pepp Now selling PepPlugs!
PeppPlugs-Personal Ear Protection Plugs for you and yours - Protect your hearing
Questions: comments? Write :
radha@peppnow.com
