These Five Facts on Veterans and Hearing Problems May Shock You

Missing appendages, post-traumatic stress, and brain trauma: These are what many people think of when they think about post-combat injuries. Hearing loss, though, may not often come to mind. Check out these 5 surprising facts about hearing loss among veterans to learn more.

1. Hearing loss is the most prevalent injury among post-combat veterans. – Hearing loss beats out PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) as the number one service-connected disability. IEDs (improvised explosive devices) can cause hearing damage just as much as commonplace military noise can. The deafening sounds of tank, plane, and ship engines contributes to temporary to permanent hearing loss and tinnitus, as do explosive devices and other loud weapons. Veterans of the post-9/11 conflicts are the most affected population in terms of hearing loss. In fact, 414,000 post 9/11 soldiers have come home with some form of tinnitus or hearing loss.

• More veterans have hearing loss than non-veterans. – Veterans are 30 percent more likely than nonveterans to suffer hearing loss of the severe kind. Worse yet, those who served after 9/11 were found to be four times more likely to be afflicted with some sort of hearing impairment than nonveterans.

• Hearing loss may be more prevalent now than it was for soldiers in the past. – Since IEDs (improvised explosive devices) have become more commonplace and weapons become bigger and louder, more soldiers are losing their hearing. Field generators and powerful “bunker buster” bombs are extremely loud and dangerous to the ears. Even helicopters can cause loss of hearing.

• Unfortunately, many of the soldiers who come home with loss of hearing do not seek help. – Most soldiers with hearing damage or tinnitus avoid seeking out help for their injury upon returning home, according to experts. They often let it go for long periods of time. Incredibly, the average time between someone noticing hearing damage and getting help for it is 7 years.

• Neuroscience innovations may be a way to alleviate severe tinnitus. – Tinnitus cannot be cured completely at this time. However, it’s severity may be linked to maladies caused by serotonin loss, such as depression, sleeplessness, and anxiety. Some veterans with tinnitus have found that anti-depressants combined with other tinnitus therapies eased their chronic condition significantly.