A recommitment to health and fitness often tops the list of New Year’s resolutions. But wouldn’t it be great if there were exercises you could do without breaking a sweat? Dr. Stacy Chalmers, Au.D. works out what it means to train vs. exercise your ears in this fun overview. Watch more Q&As, then schedule your appointment with BNA at our Bloomington-Normal or Pontiac offices.
Penny in Normal asks, “What is ear training (or ear exercises)? Can they help prevent or reverse hearing loss?” Well, ear training is used by musicians to help improve their ability to intuitively recognize components of music. While ear exercises sometimes refer to simple maneuvers provided by a medical doctor or physical therapist to help people deal with vertigo. Auditory training, or “aural rehab,” is a type of program that helps people improve their listening and comprehension skills, and while it can’t prevent or reverse hearing loss, you can kinda think of it, it’s been compared to physical therapy for the ears. So, these are sometimes self-paced, home-based, computerized programs that have exercises to help you develop skills. They can help you identify speech in background noise. Maybe help you keep up better with someone who speaks rapidly. And while there are different terms for these types of exercises, they’re all meant to help the ears discriminate, and this will potentially help people with hearing loss. So if this sounds interesting to you, this is something you can do pretty easily from the comfort of your own home, and they’re exercises you can do without even having to go sweat in the gym. I’m Dr. Stacy Chalmers from Bloomington-Normal Audiology, and we’re ‘hear’ for you.