Protecting Your Ears: 7 Take-Aways

I played the drums in elementary, junior high and high school, every single day. My parents parked my drum set in the attic where it would be 110 degrees on a summer day but it didn’t matter. I just loved to play the drums.

That experience had three residual effects on me. The first—I have an itch to buy a set of electronic drums and do it again. The second, which influences the first—I simply can’t tolerate loud music anymore. The third and most important—increasingly poor hearing. Not TERRIBLE yet. Not “watdidyasay” all the time. But not nearly as good as it would be had I not spent a decade making my ears ring every day.

The October Men’s Journal reports that half of men 35 to 55 have some kind of hearing loss. (Mind you, this is the pre-iPod generation.) So, they asked William Martin of the Oregon Health and Science University for his preventive advice. Here are the 7 take-aways:

1. Keep your iPod volume down. (I said you weren’t the iPod generation; I didn’t say you didn’t own an iPod.) If you cannot hear someone at arm’s length without taking out an ear-bud, the music is too loud. You are able to crank up a song now and then—just no prolonged exposure.

2. Stick your fingers in your ears if a sound is too loud. It really does help protect your hearing. (And it's easier than sticking your elbows in your ears.)

3. Move away from loud noise. Doubling the distance cuts the sound pressure in half.

4. Splurge on the best noise-cancelling headphones you can afford (see below).

5. Splurge on the best ear plugs you can buy as well, especially if you insist on still seeing Springsteen. Try the ER-20s.

6. Use your ear plugs when you do noisy yard work or use power tools.

7. Take breaks from loud surroundings to reduce the cumulative effect of hearing loss. Just stepping outside of a loud bar makes a difference.

Interestingly, later in the same issue, Men’s Journal surveys noise-canceling headphones and chooses the Audio-Technica ATH-ANC7 as their favorite set—better bass and audio clarity then anything but the Sennheiser PXC 450, which cost more than twice as much.

Personally, I love my Bose (first generation—the second generation hurt my ears) but would like to try the Audio-Technica just for comparison. Any experience out there? Any Christmas advice?

Posted by Entrepreneur Generations