I lost most of my hearing in my left ear in a head-on collision with a drunk driver. No other injuries. The audiologist said that my eardrum was in the kind of state you usually only see in battlefields from exposure to large explosions.
People are always surprised when I tell them this was my only injury, and as a result I've always wondered how common this type of injury is with vehicle collisions. This is the first thing I've seen which makes me believe that it's a lot more common than people suspect.
Very cool! I hope this is taken up by other brands as well.
There was a blogpost I read a few years back written by someone who damaged their hearing after dropping a porcelain toilet lid. They actually ran some back-of-the-envelope calculations to estimate the decibel level, I recall it being shockingly high.
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5. The stupid toilet bowl lid only fell about 8 inches. How could it damage my hearing so badly? I looked up the speed of sound in ceramic, divided by the length of the toilet bowl lid (and divided by 2 since the fundamental vibration is a half wavelength). This predicts 3.5 kHz.
6. This frequency is in the audible range. Using the short dimension of the toilet bowl predicts another (higher) frequency. The toilet bowl lid probably resonated at both those frequencies and their harmonics, putting all the energy into just those specific wavelengths.
7. The toilet bowl lid was not chipped or damaged, so the impact energy went mainly into sound (& internal heat) Maybe like half the impact energy went into sound energy. This lid was concave up like an antenna, near my face when it hit, focusing the energy into my face.
8. The energy travels into your inner ear and the cochlea. The pressure wave is strongest at some distance down the cochlea depending on frequency. Since the toilet bowl lid put all the energy into SPECIFIC FREQUENCIES, it was concentrated onto specific spots in the cochlea.
9. Apparently, this concentration of energy was enough to damage the hairs -- to bend them over like trampled grass -- and I was concerned it could be permanent. My hearing was only slightly better the next morning. It was like everybody was still talking at me through kazoos.
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Fascinating. Be careful around dropping shatter-proof ceramics, I suppose!
Be careful dropping glass bottles into recycling bins too; they pose nearly the same problem - they don't usually shatter and the sound escapes the bin upwards towards you.
Why isn't this taught to everyone at a young age? I had no idea this could happen and it kind of terrifies me that I can lose my hearing so easily like this without having any clue.
Then go buy the toilet lids that don’t drop with the acceleration of gravity, i. e., “soft close”. Hearing loss or not, I don’t want to hear anyone dropping the toilet lid in the middle of the night.
The culprit was actually a lid on the tank. I've never seen a toilet lid, soft close or not, that doesn't have plastic pieces that prevent full direct contact between the lid and the part below it. They'll deform under pressure, taking the noise level down from unbearable to just loud.
Yeah, I saw that it was the lid after I posted. In fact, I even remember the original post, and at the time thought, "huh, never even thought of that". Welcome to middle age, where a lot of stuff starts to occur to you after the fact. :-|
Even though this isn’t the same thing op is talking about, I also vouch for these. Slow-close toilet lids are amazing. The only problem is when you visit someone else’s house, you have to be conscious when using their toilets else you end up slamming the lid accidentally by reflexively just starting the closing process and finding out they aren’t slow-close lids (BANG!)
You look up by bending your neck and your upper back, so when your body is bent forward, looking up will actually move your head (incl your ears) further away from the glass bin.
What the other kind commenters said. I just found it worked. I like the analogy of the funnel, pointing it 90 degrees from where it usually is. OH&S wasn't such a thing back in my day (and I'm not even that old), smoking inside was still a thing (banned in that Australian state I was in a long time ago now). I'd use the air conditioners as a break to get some fresh air.
But anyway, a big bin full of glass being emptied was damn loud, but all the concerts I went to wouldn't have helped.
rather than your ears concentrating/funneling the sound into your ear canal, they would be muffling it since the direct sound wave direction would basically now point into your earlobe
I've been surprised at how loud emptying a bucket of aluminum cans into an empty bin can be, the half open lid also reflects the sound back toward you.
Yes, that's the recurrent loudest noise I experience in my life. Not so many times per year obviously, but more than concerts or disco. I should try bending knees to put my ears below the top of the bin.
I recall reading that discussion when it was first posted. There was something I didn't understand at the time, and now that it's brought up again, I want to ask: He mentions there being a fairly short window in which an ENT physician can try to treat the damage, after which no treatments will be possible. I thought all hearing damage was permanent, always, notwithstanding the potential new advances in growing the hairs back. So what exactly could they try, and what difference does time make?
This comes up fairly often on tinnitus fora. Basically there is some "consensus" that a shot of steroids within a very short window, ideally less than 24 hours, can help. Unfortunately, the most common response to damaging one's hearing seems to be to sleep it off for a week and hope it gets better, making it difficult to conduct a study on early responses.
There are studies though, and my conclusion is that it's still mostly inconclusive. Still, if my tinnitus suddenly worsened id be down at the doctor's begging for the steroids.
I had minor hearing loss after a festival, went to an ENT around 72 hours afterwards and was prescribed steroids
After a week my hearing was back to normal, so at least in my case it worked (although I guess there's a question of whether it would have recovered anyway)
Also works as an emergency short term fix for vocal folds as well - some singers if they have inflammation just before a big performance will take some, however, it's not without risk as you can cause additional (potentially irreversible) damage.
> If I understand correctly some of the most common painkillers are steroids.
Most over-the-counter painkillers (other than acetaminophen/paracetamol) are non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. OTOH, if the reason steroids work against hearing injuries is anti-inflammatory properties, NSAIDs might also work.
(OTOH, regular use of NSAIDs and acetaminophen is known to sometimes cause tinnitus and hearing loss, so, there’s that...)
To avoid confusion here, I think we are talking about ceramic cistern lids and not toilet bowl lids as the parent quote actually mentions.
The post starts off mentioning cistern lids, and the title mentions cistern lids, but lapses into toilet bowl lid about the time the parent starts quoting.
"2 I was fixing the mechanism inside the tank of the toilet. The only thing left to do was to put the ceramic lid back on the tank"
So guys, still no excuse for not putting the lid back down when you've finished ;)
Porcelain toilet lids and the metal plates on weightlifting machines are among the most dangerous common objects when it comes to hearing damage.
I've heard of cases where the plates on the machine were stuck together with grease and the user had selected a much lighter weight than usual. A number of plates below the linchpin were all the way up by the bonds of the grease before slipping and falling back down. The metal on metal impact rings out like a bell, right next to the user's head (in the case of bench press). Really nasty!
Or dumbbell bench with those heavily rubberized weights. Dropping them is about as close to silent as you can get, and the exercises are the ultimate in form-focused weight training.
They're called bumper plates! They're so you can drop a loaded bar without causing everyone to glare at you - and also to help avoid the plates bouncing onto your foot.
But you shouldn't need these on the bench. If you bench without a spotter and get stuck, move the weights to your hip and then sit up and shift them slowly to the floor like you're finishing a deadlift. (I've always called this the 'strongman escape' but it has no formal name afaik)
Haha, I’ve always heard it called the “roll of shame”.
The bumper plates are also round, which makes it easier to get a deadlift into position, and makes it land better when doing reps. The first 45 is a bumper plate, then add regular plates from there.
Resist the urge to bounce off the bottom of the rep! :-)
I think it also has to do with how rough the surface of the plates is, I believe a bit of a rough surface can help with the noise (some have a very polished surface and I can hear that from a mile)
What makes it worse is that quite a few toilet lids are self closing / soft closing these days. So if you get used to it, you start trusting the lid to close itself and take your hand from underneath the lid while it's still at a height. So it's easy to slam the lid down accidentally.
I would just like to point out that people have been hitting all sorts of things with other things for millennia and the only people getting hearing damage from it were the ones doing it particularly loudly for decades as their day job (i.e. people in loud factories).
This is below the level of terrorist attacks and shark bites in Kansas on the things to worry about list.
I've had my front airbags go off twice and didn't notice any impact on my hearing. It was just kind of a loud bang, but not to the point of causing discomfort. Maybe it varies by car and type of accident though.
Yes, but people regularly get burns and light blunt trauma from airbags. The US versions of many cars even have slightly weaker airbags, because many people don't wear seatbelts and might be killed by a full-strength airbag.
You've actually got it backward. FVMSS regulations in the US require airbags that are more forceful than the UNECE regulations in place in Europe (and other countries which follow Europe instead of the US). You're correct it is about seatbelt use, though. No seatbelt requires a faster airbag to restrain the occupant.
In modern cars the airbag will not fire if the seatbelt is not used. This is the reason why we even have seat belt detectors that make this annoying noise - not just to annoy you but also to figure out whether its safe to fire airbag or not.
Getting hit with airbag into the face when wearing eye glasses for example... that would suck, would it not?
This is completely untrue. The airbag will fire regardless of whether the seatbelt is worn, though it will be much less effective at restraining you. Out of curiosity, where on earth did you get the idea that they don’t fire?
I also work in a noisy environment, and it occurs to me that the road and engine and wind noise is probably loud enough to have a negative impact on hearing over time. Less so in newer cars, but both mine are over 10yo.
At least in most of the usa, wearing earplugs (or earbuds, headphones, etc) while operating a car, is illegal. Please check with your local PD to be safe. You may just be putting yourself and others at higher risk by attinuating your situational awareness.
I wear earplugs when I ride my motorcycle for longer trips on the highway. When people see this, they say "that's dangerous, you'll hear less" but it mostly cuts the wind noise, and counter-intuitively I end up hearing more than I would otherwise.
They make flat-frequency-response earplugs, too. They don't cost much more, and you get to keep the highs that provide context while still reducing the overall sound intensity. I love them for both motorcycle rides and concerts. You'll find several hits if you search for Musician's Earplugs.
I have some hearing damage with mild tinnitus and find it hard to follow discussions in noisy environments (bars, very noisy public transport, even some restaurants). Custom fitted flat frequency earplugs are the perfect help for these situations, I always carry them in pocket just in case.
Would you expound on this a little and perhaps mention some brands? I also have issues following discussions in those kinds of environments. I can hear the people talking, but it blends into the background noise and becomes very difficult to isolate the actual words.
Sure. My plugs are Elacin ER. I walked into a hearing aid/protection shop and got a mold of my ear canals made. Plugs were made to match the mold, took a couple of weeks and about 200€. Noise reduction is done with an exchangeable filter with different options for reduction levels, I'm using 25dB.
Not the cheapest but if you don't lose them the should last a decade.
On a motorcycle, earplugs are a necessity at speeds over 35 MPH due to wind noise. I've found that the earplugs really only cut out the wind noise for the most part though and if anything, my awareness of other cars is increased.
> At least in most of the usa, wearing earplugs (or earbuds, headphones, etc) while operating a car, is illegal. Please check with your local PD to be safe. You may just be putting yourself and others at higher risk by attinuating your situational awareness.
Actually, it seems like it's legal in most states? [0] Unless your local municpal code says differently.
Proper situational awareness while driving is a visual task. As people age, they begin to lose hearing and ability to localize sounds due to age and noise exposure. Leaning on hearing for safety becomes a liability.
That’s incredibly narrow-minded. You’re not “leaning on hearing”. You’re using all the information you can get. Hearing is vital.
How else would you know an ambulance is around the corner, about to run a red light? There are things you simply cannot see, no matter how hard you look.
Emergency response drivers never assume they've been heard by any road users and are trained to look for signs of acknowledgement and awareness before doing anything unusual for exactly this reason. They certainly don't blast at speed around blind corners against the lights.
On the other hand driving schools in Europe sometimes make us drive with construction safety devices in order to check if we can drive without hearing anything. They also obstruct the middle mirror (you're supposed to be able to drive with just side mirrors).
Not even all schools in my country do that, it's nothing standard, just something some schools around me do (and it's encouraged by the police). However I think it's illustrative of the car culture. The center mirror thing is done by all schools though.
When I was learning to drive, my biggest complaint was that I couldn't hear the engine when there was noise in the area - it was a very quiet one. It made it harder to do hill starts and clutch balancing. Now I drive a diesel.
At low speeds, driving around car parks etc, the ear plugs are out and usually have all the windows at least partly open, because I’m those environments hearing can be a huge boost to situational awareness.
I find above 40k/hr my hearing is better with ear plugs because it attenuates the road, wind, and engine noise more for me.
When cycling, I find that a simple fleece headband/hat that covers the ears is wonderful at stopping the wind noise, but letting in all the other important noises.
Well, it mostly involves leaving work with them in and leaving them in till I get where I'm going.
Plus, I've never been one to have ear infections, so I end up with used ones in all my pockets so they're pretty much always on me.
As another comment mentioned, there are flat frequency response ear plugs, Etymotic ETY ER20 are pretty cheap, reusable and cleanable. Not as much dB reduction, but that's better for some scenarios.
You would have a helmet on top if you're driving a motorcycle or bicycle, extra 20 dB is easily had with the right design, plus attenuating wind noise. Combine the two and it gets almost safe level of noise.
And a car would have pretty decent internal damping.
The general traffic is already way too loud. Can reach 80 dBA and even more in tunnels.
At low speeds, driving around car parks etc, the ear plugs are out and usually have all the windows at least partly open, because I’m those environments hearing can be a huge boost to situational awareness.
I find above 40k/hr my hearing is better with ear plugs because it attenuates the road, wind, and engine noise more for me.
Additionally, I've never been responsible for a serious accident, only a couple fender-benders when I was much younger.
That's exactly what I am thinking whenever I hear music from within a car passing by. Blanking out driving noises with the car stereo is much worse for aural situational awareness than plugs could ever be.
The difference is that they obviously use cars that are modified and certified for use with foot controls(at least here in EU they are, I wouldn't be surprised if US didn't require any certification whatsoever). You also get a restriction on your licence saying that you can only drive such vehicles. A deaf person doesn't have any restrictions - my point is that there is no functional or legal difference between a deaf person driving and a person driving with earplugs in, the law doesn't specify a requirement that you have to be able to hear to drive.
The law doesn't have to require something to make it not a good idea.
My point was, I'm not deaf, but I'm fairly sure that on average deaf people are much better adapted to life with limited hearing than you or I would be when wearing ear buds. It doesn't logically follow that because a deaf person is allowed to drive we should be able to artificially reduce our hearing ability while driving.
I've had both front airbags deployed in a compact car with closed windows. Impaired hearing on the right ear (left-hand drive car) was the only damage I took.
People are always surprised when I tell them this was my only injury, and as a result I've always wondered how common this type of injury is with vehicle collisions. This is the first thing I've seen which makes me believe that it's a lot more common than people suspect.
Very cool! I hope this is taken up by other brands as well.