What is 'Hidden Hearing Loss' and how is it treated?

Hidden Hearing Loss is the term used to desribe a condition where someone exhibits difficulty hearing where the typical hearing test, the audiogram, does not indicate an actual hearing deficit.  More commonly, a person with Hidden Hearing Loss may have difficulty hearing in noise and may perform perfectly well in quiet listening situations.  The proposed origin is in the connection of the nerve cells with hair cells of the of inner ear.   Damage to the ear from repeated noise exposure may be a possible cause. 

A hidden hearing loss is caused by noise that has damaged the nerve cells that connect the cochlea in the inner ear to the brain and the nerve cells’ ability to send information to the brain is reduced. The brain then receives lesser and poorer information from the ear. A hidden hearing loss is a type of hearing loss that cannot be measured by the most common hearing tests and for people with hidden hearing loss, their audiogram looks as it does for someone with normal hearing.