and good evening.

>> Thank you so much for watching HealthLine on PBS Fort Wayne.

I'm your host Mark Evans.

Another very interesting show tonight we're going to be talking about hearing and we had a special guest last month Ted Blanford who is back with us tonight.

>> Ted, great to see you.

Thanks for having me back.

And we had to kind of cut things short because we were really engrossed in the conversation.

>> Of course it's only a half hour show so I said we've got to have you back in a few weeks and here you are and we're going to go deeper and show some of the subjects that we talked about and it looks like you brought some some visuals.

>> Yes, we did get some samples of hearing aids.

Absolutely.

So we'll take a look at those in just a few minutes.

But we want to go ahead and open up those phone lines and the telephone lines are open for you right now at 866- (969) 27 two zero.

>> Go ahead and give us a call throughout the show.

It's a half hour program.

It is PBS and we won't be stopping down for commercials.

So please have those calls coming in whether it's for yourself or a loved one or both.

>> Get those phone calls in.

That's what Ted is here for .

>> So Ted, let's go ahead and just kind of review to get everyone up to speed who didn't watch last month.

But how do we here how does that function?

Well, the end result as we hear with our brain but how do we get that that signal to the brain is our voice.

Our sound is pressure.

It sends it down the ear canal and is amplified by the bones inside of our ear and interesting what we call the cochlea where there's what we call hair cells or nerve endings and those nerve endings are struck by that by that pressure of sound sending it through an auditory nerve and that that auditory nerve sends it to the brain and that's how we hear.

So in simple terms, yes, we hear with our brain we don't hear necessarily with our ears.

We collect with our ears.

But inside of our brain that's where we hear OK and then I know that you're a huge advocate on on the connection between hearing health and overall health .

>> So how does having a problem with hearing have a direct effect on on your health ?

>> OK, untreated hearing loss you gives you increased dementia or risk of dementia up to two to five hundred percent of increased risk for dementia .

>> Do you know why or do they know why?

Well, yes, because you have auditory deprivation when the brain does not get the signals that it needs.

We use our brain to help our hearing to help our entire brain and we don't remember what's being said and our brain changes shape.

It changes and it shrinks and we have a place called the hippocampus in our brain.

Right.

It helps with our memory that is not getting the information that it needs.

>> It also shrinks.

It also is inactive and it goes dark.

So it's not being stimulated?

No, it's not being stimulated and that's that's a great way of putting it.

So those with a hearing loss have a higher rate of risk of dementia, also a higher risk of faster cognitive decline 30 to 40 percent faster cognitive decline than those who have corrected hearing loss or no hearing loss at all.

>> For those who don't know, explain the cognitive what what does that mean when we are trying to process something that's being said or a decision being made or trying to figure out what we are hearing in a conversation?

It the cognition is how fast we're able to process it and engage well when as we age we tend to slow down on our cognition anyway.

But when we don't have all the information the brain has to work that much harder to be able to understand what's being said.

Thus decisions are slower thinking a slower and the overall brain activity is slower.

>> Well I read something today when I was doing a little research for the program that falls the chances of falling increase when you have a hearing is when you have a hearing problem you have you have you report half a person with a hearing loss is more likely to have a history of falling by three times three times by three times a history or falling by three times if you have a hearing loss as opposed to a person with normal hearing or those with the corrected hearing.

>> That's pretty amazing.

That's quite a bit yeah it really is now and we talked last show about hearing versus understanding people hear what you're saying they can even watch your lips and help put it together.

>> But if they don't understand I think it's a consonant thing, isn't it?

Well, it's the difference between understanding and what I saw say loudness or clarity.

OK, OK, The low tones, the vowel sounds, those those sounds are the low frequency sounds.

Those are the sounds that says there is a voice present, there is sound present.

There is something that is making sound that is the body of the of the hearing where we talk about the consonant sounds that make sounds sound f sounds those sounds that give us meaning of the words being said that is where we have the understanding or the clarity of speech.

Those are the two I call the two halves of our hearing I hear and I understand we need to have that complete hearing is incomplete unless you can understand what's being said then it becomes a communication.

>> Yeah.

And that's when your brain gets stimulated and all that and that's when it all registers exactly right.

It's all put together.

>> All right.

If you're just joining us now we have a special guest, Ted Blanford who is a hearing instrument specialist and audio Prust followed just yes, I got that out easily this time after a lot of practice.

So thank you for the coaching on that.

And we're taking your phone calls right now at (969) 27 zero and we're talking about hearing issues and what can be done to help those.

So we've talked about several things so far but I want to go ahead.

>> In fact, a friend of mine asked me make sure you asked Ted this he is getting ready to make a phone call and go see someone about his hearing situation.

>> He was wondering if you can kind of in a nutshell give him an idea of what a good hearing exam consist of and what he should expect.

Well, what to expect from a hearing exam.

First of all, we need to know who you are.

We need to know a little bit about you your history so we do what we call an intake a little bit of medical history, a little history of your of your hearing loss if you feel like there's any tinnitus or anything like this, medications you're taking, is there any history of falls or any history of of of surgeries or things such as that that allows us to know a little about what we're going to experience when we do our testing?

>> Sure.

OK, and then we check insurance if it's applicable and then then we get into the meat and potatoes of what we do.

>> We look in your ears called otoscope exam so the scope in there and actually look up and not only do we look ourselves but it would be a very otoscope practitioners and Fort Wayne especially we have we have great equipment called a video otoscope otoscope so you can see the ear canal yourself.

>> Now what we're looking for is malformation or wax not wax could muffle hearing and we know that.

>> So hopefully fingers are crossed.

Is it wax causing the hearing loss will they identify that?

>> Is the is the eardrum intact?

Is there anything that would cause any any issues that we could not go forward with an exam and then we would do a speech understanding test or speech discrimination test?

>> I want to find out what we with the practitioner wants to do is find out what you understand where your missing words consonant vowel consonant words are you understanding them clearly the clarity versus loudness and then a familiar voice test if you're bringing someone a loved one with you, how well do you hear their voice?

>> My voice is important are practitioners of voices important audiologists voice is important but the person is most important is the person with you and is with you most often.

>> And then of course we do the baseline audiogram we call it the beeps and Bong's we will find out what you hear and what you don't hear and we put that in a graph and then we explain that graph to you and we and then we would be then you would be put together with a a demonstration set of instruments to see how the instruments could actually help you all audiologists, all of hearing specialists that is the flow of the testing.

>> And how long would that take on an average when somebody comes out there aren't any complications just to get your hearing checked and get evaluated, I would expect ninety minutes or so.

>> So expect about an hour and a half.

Yes, about an hour and a half and sometimes a little bit more.

>> I mean and it's not something you want to rush through.

No.

Is it hearing is such an important aspect of our lives we should take an hour and a half maybe even two if it's something that you really want to get down deep into what's going on, it's important enough to take that time.

>> Absolutely.

Absolutely.

All right.

Well thank you for that and we're going to go on and take a look at some of these gadgets.

You have some very important gadgets as a matter of fact and just take the lead and show us what we're looking at.

>> Well, what we're looking at we're looking at behind that you're hearing instruments.

We're looking at receiver in the canal hearing instruments we're looking at in the ear and in the canal instruments and what we call a CIC or completely in the canal hearing now and you can go ahead and I think we should keep them in the camera range here.

What we what we're looking at from here is a what we'd call a custom molded in the canal or I'm sorry the receiver in the canal hearing instrument a receiver, the canal instrument a behind the ear hearing aid this would be the next to this would be a in the ear hearing aid and now that's a custom hearing instrument to the hearing aid that you would do a a mold first to have it sent to have it custom made oh usually by a 3-D printer where IFB is in the studios very similar here.

The director talked to us but I had a mole done for that's a that's very similar to that exactly like that exactly.

>> They make them the same way and the ones next to the smaller ones now those are in the canal and that really small red one that's really cool and that's what shows a little antenna on the top.

Well that's not really an antenna that's to help you take it out of your ear because does go deep enough into your canal where it's almost invisible.

>> I have to tell you a story.

I told you this before but it's just one of those stories I love to tell.

>> I had a neighbor nicest guy and we were on the homeowners association so we talked a lot lot of times on the phone.

>> But he came over when I first got to meet him and he was shouting and yelling and I my goodness, I mean is this guy upset?

>> Is this just the way this guy rolls all the time?

Well, about two or three weeks later he comes back over to talk about an issue and he all of a sudden got softer and quieter and he was talking normal tone of voice and I noticed this this is the type of hearing aid he had.

>> I saw just a little bit of that thing popping up at his ear canal.

>> I betcha he just got here you got hearing aids and he told me that see how hearing aids can change the world around you.

>> Yeah.

And I thought the man was always mad yelling, you know, but he I guess his wife and his wife is responsible for of course to and that happens a lot to me but it made a big difference in his temperament was so much cooler and just he was just a nice guy anyway but I'm so glad to see him get that help.

And this leads to something my grandmother told me a long time ago you can't yell at someone and say I love you and look like you mean so sometimes when we don't hear well and we are loud our facial expressions don't reflect who we really are because we don't know how loud we're speaking right.

>> Because of our hearing loss having that corrected calms the world around us too.

Oh well I'm sure it does.

>> I'm sure it does so and I noticed that you said this is a behind the ear hearing aid this one here now that one that goes behind the ear as well, don't they?

>> Yes, they do go behind the year but the reason they call those receiver in the canal is the the larger hearing instrument, larger hearing aid would have a custom told through a tube and all the ingredients and all the guts if you will.

The mechanics are inside the body of the hearing aid whereas with the receiver in the canal hearing aids, the the microphones and the processors are in the body and the receiver and the amplifiers are in your ear so it gives it a better, sharper sound.

>> Let me ask you this do you ever have patients who have not difficulty but it takes time for them to get used to their hearing aids adaptation is critical to understand it.

>> The we here with our brain and we've taken so long and gradual hearing loss it's going to take time for us to reach ignite those nerve endings and the and the synapse and the neural pathways to the brain to be comfortable hearing what we should be hearing.

>> Well, and I would imagine to be kind of a pleasant experience on top of that though, being able to hear things that you haven't heard.

>> Absolutely.

And if you do it correctly and we have our audiologist in the Fort area some of the best slow, smooth and easy let your brain adapt to the sounds that you're supposed to need.

No need to jump into it.

Did it took you this long to get help?

Right.

Let's take a little bit of time to get it to get that help to be effective.

>> Well, I have a few relatives and friends who have hearing aids and then there's not a single one who said gee, I wish I hadn't have done this right.

>> So how often have we heard I probably should have done the soon I've done this years ago.

>> All right.

Line five we have Jeremy on the phone and he prefers to be offline.

That's OK off the air.

So he's asking as they transcribe the question for me why do we hear a ringing in our ear sometimes and we talked about this in the last show but if you don't mind addressing that for a couple of seconds.

>> Yeah, well that's called tinnitus.

Jeremy, thank you for your question.

Absolutely.

Oh, that's a really good question because tinnitus affects about fifty million people across across America today and when those nerve center the nerve cells we showed earlier the hair cells that we talk about when they're damaged they're sending erroneous electrical impulses to the brain and the brain takes that impulse as sound.

So those random sounds to the electrical pulses to the brain come out as a ringing, a humming, a buzzing or crickets .

There's several other descriptions of sounds for tinnitus but that's how tinnitus happens and when we have it randomly like a me for just a short few ten seconds every so often that's the same thing.

>> Those nerve endings inside your cochlea are being damaged and they're sending a signal to the brain to let you know that they're damaged.

>> Very good.

OK, thank you for addressing that.

>> Now getting more into this modern technology, I have a friend who actually is a pig farmer in Ossian, Indiana.

>> Nicest guy.

His name's Mike but he has worked on a pig farm for 50 plus years now.

>> I haven't known him that long but he's a great guy and I got to the point where I could say, Mike, why are you wearing hearing aids?

>> And he says, well, pigs squeal really loud.

They do and he explained the barn that he works in and he has hundreds of pigs and when one starts squealing the rest squeal.

>> So he actually attributes his hearing loss to the pig squealing so the environmental thing plays.

>> It's a huge role, isn't it?

Yes.

If you look at the especially we focus on baby boomers a lot 65 and over.

Yeah, And almost half of them have hearing loss.

Remember that's the generation also grew up with the best rock and roll.

>> Oh absolutely the best speakers and the best speakers when we knew them right real close to the greatest concerts and environment we worked in factories we we we we had we tuned our own cars, airplanes, sounds, all these activities we had also our part of noise pollution and causes some hearing loss now of that over half of baby boomers that report having a hearing loss.

The unfortunate thing is very few were actually doing something about it.

>> Right.

And you're looking at what I'm right now being in radio most of my career wearing headphones and as I mentioned to you before, those headphones over the years if not at almost every month got louder and louder and louder and I know I have a little bit of deafening because of that so I need to get that checked out soon.

>> I'm going to take a break here with you here, Ted, and we're going go to the telephones because we have Megan calling in.

>> Megan is preferring to stay off the air but she's saying how does a hearing aid help with tinnitus?

>> That's a really good question.

Now they're not all hearing aids are created equal as you would see as you would think.

>> But for the first thing, a properly fit hearing aid will help the natural sounds around to soothe those nerve endings, give it healthy impulses of electricity, sending it to the brain.

So the natural sounds are overriding those erroneous sounds that we were talking about before.

And also if it comes to the point where you need noise or sound therapy, some hearing instruments have what they have what they call a massacre agent inside the hearing aid itself and the audiologist and hearing specialists can program that masking agent by identifying where your tinnitus is and then we can help soothe the brain by giving a competing sound in that area.

So hearing aids first of all fill in the void where you're missing it.

We call it like almost like a highway from your ear to your brain if there's potholes in that highway there's not a smooth ride.

>> We want to make it as smooth as possible by filling it in with healthy sound .

>> That's the first step.

But if we need to do therapeutic work, we'll also use the the tinnitus blockers to help give a competing sound so the brain is relaxed and able to accept those natural sounds better and it'll push the tinnitus to the background.

It won't cure tinnitus because there is no cure but it will help manage your tinnitus very effective.

>> I've heard people rave about it so I think it's wonderful technology that's had I notice that you're wearing hearing aids.

>> Yes, I'm practicing what you preach.

>> Yes.

All of these here which one is most similar?

I have I would say that the there's this one here is the most similar to mine if you look at that a receiver in the canal, your hearing instrument.

Now notice if I can get it to stand up there you notice that it is a behind the ear hearing instrument but it's also the receiver goes into my ear.

>> That's how I wear and it's very comfortable.

It's very functional and it has directional microphones to help me in crowds it has you can accessorize with a hearing aid like that with remote microphones to help with people that you really have a difficult time hearing.

You can connect these hearing aids to your smartphone so you can have your phone, your phone calls go directly to your hearing aids.

So if you're struggling on the telephone on a daily basis, being competitive in the business world today as are our baby boomers are delaying their retirement because of the economy or health issues or are having that ability to speak on the telephone directly from your cell phone to your hearing aids is a game changer.

>> Yeah, I can almost imagine and in fact I'm looking forward to getting my hair and my hearing amped up a little bit myself.

>> You mentioned medications earlier which struck a chord.

How do medications affect your hearing?

>> There's things called odl toxicity.

Oh think of this as our blood system now our ears have a huge amount of blood flow through the the cochlea and the ear canal now as anything goes into the blood system goes through the ears as well.

Now if you have a toxicity or a drug that causes hearing loss or weakening of the hearing, it will flow through the ears itself and it'll dampen those those nerve endings.

>> Wow.

Yeah.

So there's over 200 over the counter and prescriptive drugs that have in their side effects weakening of the hearing or hearing loss.

>> I never noticed that and I I'm a I'm a label reader.

Yeah.

One I never noticed them.

>> That's very also ringing in the ears as well.

Yeah.

And when you mentioned that I thought no I better ask more questions about that.

>> Let's see we wanted to talk about the importance the whole we talked about the health thing, how it affects health and you have a few minutes here you could take the floor but how why let me start back here at this question how should you identify that you have problems when when do you know you have hearing issues and you need to see a specialist for the most most part is not going to be very apparent to us to ourselves.

>> We don't know what we don't know for the most part because we're getting used to it and our brain also allows us to have a whole bag of excuses.

Oh, we should listen to those who love us.

They will tell us the truth.

They if they're telling us that we're having difficulty hearing and we continuously hear the same thing, we should believe them and that's where we need to seek.

But also if you start noticing that you're asking people to repeat themselves, you're having difficulty hearing and understanding with background noise if you are if you are listening to a television program and you're needing to turn it up to figure out what they're trying to say, you're having difficulty hearing also one of the things that is quite apparent is when you answer a question and you get the RCA dog look.

>> Yeah, And they you realize you answered something a little different than what they ask.

>> Those are the times when you really need to take a look at yourself in the mirror.

Absolutely.

And say you know what I think I might want to have myself looked at when it comes to hearing I have a hearing exam we have like I said, we have some amazing folks here in Fort Wayne just waiting to be able to help you with your hearing.

>> Yeah, and they should it's very important, you know and I think that it also would affect not only physical health but mental health but it sure does now understand a person with a hearing loss is more likely to avoid social environments.

Right.

Guys are going to report a higher level higher number of depression anxiety than those that have their hearing correct or with hearing aids or those with with normal and taking yourself away from the people that love you is not how we correct that issue.

>> No, it's certainly doesn't help with our anxiety, certainly doesn't help with our depression.

I know I told the story last time but for our viewers watching tonight my grandmother was going deaf and it was very apparent and you would talk to her and she would just kind of do that that RCA dog thing and we finally convinced her that she needed to go and get some help and her big thing was at that time she had no insurance and it was a very expensive thing at that time.

So family members pitched in and hearing aids as a Christmas present.

And I got to tell you something we struggled for about two or three years with that dear lady.

We just see that she was being depressed.

She was frustrated.

She just wasn't enjoying life and she used to she was a spitfire as far as enjoying life when she got those hearing aids, it was Automat.

>> Her eyes look like Christmas.

I mean she just lit up like a Christmas tree and we were so grateful so was she.

>> So she lived another six or seven years and just really enjoyed life and it's a life changer.

It really is a life chamber.

It's the first time since we have before we're born into last since we have been home before we go home and lets us enjoy the people we love.

>> That's right.

For a person 30 seconds.

>> OK, some parting words from Ted.

Let us hear each other so we can love each other.

>> Oh could have said that better myself.

You're certainly the pro on that.

>> Thank you.

All right.

Very good.

Ted Blanford hearing instrument specialists in audio press theologist obviously you're very passionate about what you do and we thank you for being here and supporting PBS Fort Wayne.

>> Thank you for having me.

>> Absolutely.

We were going to have you back again very soon.

I hope so.

I hope so too.

In the meantime, thank you for watching.

>> We will be back next week.

In fact, Jennifer Blomquist will be here.

We'll be talking about youth mental health until then, thank you for watching.

>> Good night and good