Single-sided deafness
Single-sided deafness (SSD) means you have little or no hearing in one ear, while your other ear hears normally or has only mild hearing loss.
There are hearing devices that could help, and communication tactics you can use.
Causes of single-sided deafness
Single-sided deafness can happen for many different reasons, including:
- sudden hearing loss in one ear
- conditions such as Ménière’s disease
- acoustic neuroma, a non-cancerous growth on the hearing and balance nerves
- severe ear infections
- head injury or trauma to the ear
Sometimes, the cause is not known.
How single-sided deafness can affect you
When you only hear from one ear, it can be harder to tell where sounds are coming from.
This is because the brain uses timing and loudness information from both ears to work out which direction sounds come from.
When your hearing loss is more severe in one ear than the other, it can make everyday situations more difficult, such as:
- crossing the road safely, because it’s harder to tell which direction a car is coming from
- understanding speech in noisy places, because it’s harder to pick out a particular voice
- enjoying music or group conversations
Ways to manage single-sided deafness
There are several ways to manage single-sided deafness. Your audiologist can work with you to discover which options might work best for you.
Hearing aids and implants
CROS and BiCROS hearing aids send sound from your deaf ear to your hearing ear.
A bone conduction hearing implant (BCHI) is a surgically implanted device that sends sound vibrations through the skull from your deaf side to your hearing ear.
Assistive listening devices
Remote microphones can be worn by a speaker and send sounds to a receiver worn on your hearing ear.
There are other assistive technologies that could help.
Communication tactics
Many people with SSD find they can manage without any hearing devices, particularly if they have grown up with this type of hearing loss.
You may naturally develop strategies that help, such as:
- sitting with your hearing ear towards the speaker or noise you want to hear
- choosing quieter places for conversations
- using visual cues like lip reading
- changing the settings on devices like headphones so that the sound only comes out of one side