Who doesn’t love cookies? Unfortunately, cookie-bite hearing loss has little to do with chocolate chips. Instead, cookie-bite hearing loss takes its name from the way it appears on an audiogram: as if a bite were taken out of the middle.
Sound Frequencies and Hearing Thresholds
Humans can hear a wide range of frequencies, from low to high. Frequencies are measured in Hertz (Hz), with lower frequencies represented by lower numbers and higher frequencies by higher numbers. For example, the lowest note of a piano is 27.5 Hz, which is almost the lowest frequency a human can perceive. The highest note is 4,186 Hz.
The results of your hearing test are printed out on a chart known as an audiogram. This chart is a visualization of what frequencies of sound you can hear at what volumes. The softest volume at which you can hear each frequency is known as your hearing threshold.
Cookie-bite hearing loss, also called mid-range hearing loss or mid-frequency sensorineural hearing loss (MFSNHL), means that your audiogram results have a large dip in the middle, indicating that you have a harder time hearing frequencies in the mid-range of human hearing, and are better at hearing high frequencies and low frequencies.
Symptoms of Cookie-Bite Hearing Loss
Mid-frequency sounds include most of human speech and music. This means that someone with cookie-bite hearing loss will struggle with hearing these things. This could look like:
- Difficulty understanding speech, especially in noisy environments
- Speech is audible, but you’re unable to make out the words clearly
- It sounds like everyone is mumbling
- Difficulty following dialogue in movies or television shows, even with the volume turned up
- Difficulty hearing clearly when speaking on the telephone
- Missing parts of music or melodies, especially mid-range instruments or vocals
Causes of Cookie-Bite Hearing Loss
Cookie-bite hearing loss is a type of sensorineural hearing loss, meaning that it originates due to damage, dysfunction or impairment to the sensory cells in the inner ear or auditory nerve. However, normally, when these sensory cells are damaged or deteriorate, it is the high-frequency sounds we lose first, not the mid-range. This is why cookie-bite hearing loss is considered rare, and it can be difficult to diagnose and determine the cause. Typically, it’s a genetic condition, either present at birth or acquired over time.
Treating Cookie-Bite Hearing Loss
As with all types of hearing loss, there is no cure, but hearing aids are a very effective option for treatment. Hearing aids work by collecting sound information in a microphone, processing those sounds in a sophisticated digital sound processor and projecting them into the ear. The superpower lies in the digital sound processor; for people with cookie-bite hearing loss, the sound processor will identify the mid-range sounds and amplify them, making up for the gaps in the natural hearing ability.
To learn more about cookie-bite hearing loss or how hearing aids work and can help treat hearing loss, contact Hearing Services of Santa Barbara. We’d be happy to schedule an appointment or answer your questions.