There are many different types of treatment for hearing loss. Sometimes, your doctors will recommend surgery.
Is it safe to try to reverse your hearing loss surgically? Medical professionals should always make sure that your body can take the strain of a surgical procedure. For most adults, hearing-related surgeries don’t create any complications.
Since there are many different kinds of hearing loss, there’s a variety of different surgeries you can get. Here are three important examples:
1. Stapedectomy
This procedure involves removing your stapes and putting a stainless steel prosthesis in its place. The stapes is a small, horseshoe-shaped bone from your middle ear. When an irregularly shaped stapes causes hearing loss, surgery can help.
Once your stapes is replaced, your hearing should return to normal. Risk factors include too much bleeding, a perforated eardrum and facial paralysis.
2. Eardrum Repair Surgery
Your eardrum can perforate or rupture for a number of reasons, such as infections or head trauma. In many cases, the damage can repair itself, but this isn’t always possible.
Your doctor can do lighter eardrum repair surgery without anesthesia. They can simply patch up your eardrum using a paper-like material.
However, if the perforation is too big, you may need to go under general anesthesia. In this case, a surgeon will create a patch from your own vein or muscle tissue. Your surgeon may reach your eardrum through the ear canal, or they can make a small opening behind your ear instead.
Eardrum repair surgery can restore your hearing very effectively. It’s important to avoid any infections during the recovery period.
3. Cochlear Implant Surgery
In some cases, it may not be possible to reverse your hearing loss surgically or in any other way. Thus, you may want to look into hearing implants. Although they can’t save your hearing, hearing implants can replace some important neural functions.
During implant surgery, a surgeon places a small device into your inner ear. This will send electric impulses to your brain.
Hearing implant surgery carries some risk of meningitis or other infections. However, complications are rare, and it can bring huge changes to your life.
