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Sudden hearing loss from Covid

olds1959special

olds1959special

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These past few weeks have been tough. Besides all the other symptoms of Covid I also lost a lot of high frequencies in my hearing. I just had a hearing test and it’s worse in my left ear. The decongestants didn’t seem to help. 12 days after this started I went to the doctor. I am now on Prednisone and I’m starting to feel improvements. I was talking on the phone and a heard a little pop and a ringing sound and my hearing opened up slightly in my right ear. Maybe these small improvements will keep happening over the 5 day course of treatment. I think I’m still in the window where this medication can help with sudden hearing loss, but I could have seen the doctor a few days earlier. I didn’t know about any of this, if I would have known I would have tried to see the doctor sooner. However it hasn’t been 30 days yet so I may be able to salvage my hearing? The ENT appointment isn’t for another 21 days. This is extremely hard for someone who is a sound engineer by profession and a musician. Anyone else go through something like this and get help from Prednisone pills (or injections?)
 
OK there are two types of hearing loss that can occur with COVID: sensorineural hearing loss, and conductive hearing loss. Conductive hearing loss is due to nasal congestion, this causes fluid build-up that blocks the Eustachian tube and prevents proper transmission of sound waves to the cochlea. The treatment is nasal decongestants. Sensorineural hearing loss is due to inflammation of the nerve cells that transmit sound from the cochlea - same mechanism as loss of taste or smell after COVID. Sometimes it is accompanied by tinnitus or dizziness due to disturbance of the vestibular system. The treatment is steroids to reduce the inflammation (Prednisolone) and betahistine (for dizziness, if present).

It is important to distinguish between the two causes of hearing loss so that proper treatment can be given. Prompt intervention reduces the chance of prolonged recovery (or even lack of recovery in some unfortunate cases).
 
Keith_W said:
OK there are two types of hearing loss that can occur with COVID: sensorineural hearing loss, and conductive hearing loss. Conductive hearing loss is due to nasal congestion, this causes fluid build-up that blocks the Eustachian tube and prevents proper transmission of sound waves to the cochlea. The treatment is nasal decongestants. Sensorineural hearing loss is due to inflammation of the nerve cells that transmit sound from the cochlea - same mechanism as loss of taste or smell after COVID. Sometimes it is accompanied by tinnitus or dizziness due to disturbance of the vestibular system. The treatment is steroids to reduce the inflammation (Prednisolone) and betahistine (for dizziness, if present).

It is important to distinguish between the two causes of hearing loss so that proper treatment can be given. Prompt intervention reduces the chance of prolonged recovery (or even lack of recovery in some unfortunate cases).
Click to expand...
I’ve been taking Allegra every day and I think the congestion part is better now but I did have loss of taste and smell so I think this is sensorineural. That’s why I’m hoping the Prednisolone will help. I’m taking 40mg but asking about a higher dose like 60mg. It’s been about 12 days since I definitely noticed the issue so I think I’m still within the window but would have seen the doctor three days earlier when an appointment opened up had I known more about this. I thought at that point it was congestion that would pass.
 
You need a Rinne and Weber test to distinguish the two causes. If the ENT appointment is too far away, go see an audiologist. Or, if you happen to have a 512Hz tuning fork, you can do it yourself. It's a pretty easy test to administer, just google for instructions.
 
Corticosteroids are the golden standard in cases like this, European guidelines sometimes recommend even higher doses but when you have caught it much earlier…
Of course you need to get out of this treatment with proper tapering of the doses, make sure the stomach is well protected too , check your blood pressure as well.

12 days is a bit too late unfortunately, Covid causes micro thrombosis of the capillary and the hearing nerve might get permanently damaged, we have had good results with low molecular weight heparin for a few days if there are no contraindications.

You can also use Gingko Biloba extracts but look for ones that have a standardised amount of Ebg 761 as those are actually medications, not just OTC products.

All of the above needs to be very well judged by a doctor who has the responsibility to discover conditions that may make not be known prior to the Covid infection as well as drug interactions which can lead to severe side effects or incidents.
 
Good luck with your recovery. I'm 66, tinnitus for years. Diabetes for less years than tinnitus. Had sudden (some) hearing loss in rt ear for no reason at all. Took about a month to see an ENT. He mechanically removed a bunch of wax but did nothing for my hearing loss. I had COVID B4 there were vax's. I dont remember much about those 2 weeks. Sickest ever in my life.
 
Started Ginkgo (just extract pills I could find at the store) and getting acupuncture today. I’m still feeling the muffled hearing, the improvement has been minimal so far. This is depressing and I’m just trying to deal with one day at a time. I got an earlier ENT appointment but it’s still 16 days away.
 
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I lost most high frequencies in one ear after COVID. What is annoying is that the upper mids in that ear are now distorted so I don't enjoy music much most days (it varies day to day). Steroids do help restore some of my hearing loss but you can't take them forever, unfortunately, and it takes a fairly high dose to restore high frequencies in that ear.

I am currently taking a low dose steroid to help with a transition to a new medication. The lower dose (4mg Medrol) helps my hearing a bit, enough to allow me to get some enjoyment from music on good days.

The catch is, even with the low dose, it makes your blood sugar go crazy and you get fat.

I've heard that there's a medicine available in Canada (it's not approved for use in the USA) that can help.
 
Keith_W said:
Don't bother with the acupuncture. You may as well invest money in cable risers.
Click to expand...

The acupuncture may or may not have helped. If it did it was about a 10 percent improvement. It included electro-stimulation with moxibustion. If anything, it helped me relax.

But cable risers made a big difference, now I can hear better than ever before! I simply placed one cable riser under each armpit for the bilateral hearing loss and it worked!
 
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Seriously, medical snake oil is far more insidious than audio snake oil. Audio snake oil only costs you money, and even then most people consider it disposable income. Very few people would spend so much on audio snake oil until they are destitute. Medical snake oil can cost you your health, sometimes your life, and I have seen a lot of people deplete family savings in a desperate attempt to do something about their illness. I don't get angry with audio snake oil, I laugh at them. But medical snake oil gets me genuinely worked up. They aren't just charlatans, they are evil charlatans.

Maybe a bit of acupuncture for a non-life threatening illness is harmless, as long as you continue with conventional therapy. But you are better off spending that money on a nice steak dinner.
 
Keith_W said:
Seriously, medical snake oil is far more insidious than audio snake oil. Audio snake oil only costs you money, and even then most people consider it disposable income. Very few people would spend so much on audio snake oil until they are destitute. Medical snake oil can cost you your health, sometimes your life, and I have seen a lot of people deplete family savings in a desperate attempt to do something about their illness. I don't get angry with audio snake oil, I laugh at them. But medical snake oil gets me genuinely worked up. They aren't just charlatans, they are evil charlatans.

Maybe a bit of acupuncture for a non-life threatening illness is harmless, as long as you continue with conventional therapy. But you are better off spending that money on a nice steak dinner.
Click to expand...
I hear you. I consider it complementary not alternative medicine!
 
Gone are the days of “primum non nocere”, man should be careful with magical pills, podcasts and AI helpers with hallucination…

We were one of the busiest COVID departments, never seen a disease like that. People often miss that it is a microvascular killer and that is why the lungs are affected most - they are just like sugar floss and when every single capillary is clogged then you get the ground-glass symptom on X Ray. But every single part of the body could be affected, I have a friend who needs a hip replacement at 40, brain fog and many other weird symptoms . Thank God it is behind.

For SNHL best is to start immediately with hyperbaric oxygen therapy, high doses of CS for the first days and tapering and a tail with mild vasodilator medication like Tebokan for a few weeks. Acupuncture won’t harm, we have done a thorough research on literature and would do anything to help patients without the risk of adverse effects but so far only CS work consistently.
 
I'm on my last day of the 5-day course of 40mg prednisone. My doctor got back to me and said she would prescribe 60mg and I can keep taking it. Honestly I don't really know how much it helped. I'm not clear on how much hearing loss I had before Covid, since I haven't had a hearing test in a while, but overall I'm feeling better. Occasionally my ears would ring a little which I consider a good sign I'm getting some sensitivity back. I'm starting to psychologically cope with the low energy and lingering symptoms of Covid that I'm feeling, which the hearing loss has been a part of. I'm not sure if there is any remaining congestion because sometimes I feel a little more muffled hearing so it comes and goes, but in general things are improving. I'm starting to be able to enjoy music again and hoping I'll get better as time goes on, and I'm going to be starting on the higher dose of CS. I've been taking lots of ginkgo extract pills too. This whole ordeal with Covid has been somewhat life changing, but the worst is over and as I understand it, I should feel better from Long Covid in 12-18 months, if it takes that long. I'm 46 years old. I have faith in the healing abilities of the human body.
 
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On the 2nd day of my 2nd 5 day course of presnidone - my doc increased the dose to 60mg. Now I'm kind of about 3 weeks away from my initial symptoms, so still within the 30 day window. Anyway I'm feeling somewhat better. Only 3 more days of meds to go, which is good because they give me a stomach ache. I'm enjoying music and my sound systems again and not really noticing hearing loss right now.
 
Hope it resolves. I had sensorineural hearing loss (left ear) and I was given a very high dose of prednisone as a matter of emergency. Basically, (AFAIR) 120mg of Prednisone and only then they did audio testing and other diagnosis. The opinion being that it was important to reduce inflamation ASAP to mitigate long term damage/loss.

I lost about 80% from 6600-7500hz.

I cant recall if my tinnitus was this bad before. But it is concentrated on my left side.
 
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