Your Ears

You & Your ears
Hearing loss is not something uncommon in our country. In fact, in the world right now, hearing loss present at all age groups including babies, children, teenagers, adults and old folks. By knowing the nature of your hearing problem, you can make the correct decision either to wear hearing aids or you simply need to know some communication strategies to help in your everyday life. You can also select the correct hearing aids from the market once you know about your hearing problem. But, it is best to know your ears first in order to really understand what is your hearing status right now
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The structure of your ear
Physically, our ear can be divided into three (3) parts, which are the outer ear, the middle ear and the inner ear (Figure 1). The outer ear includes our pinna and external ear canal. Mean while, the middle ear includes the ear drum, ossicular chain ( the 3 smallest bone in our body which is the incus, malleus and stapes) the middle ear cavity and the Eustachian’s tube ( a tube that connect our ear to the throat).

The inner ear, instead, consist of the cochlear, semi-secular canal and the auditory nerve, the nerve that was responsible to deliver the sound information to the brains. In the brain, this information will be analyzed and will be interpreted as hearing sensation. This is the reason why we can experience the sensation of hearing.

In order to hear normally, all of the ear structure mentioned above must be in normal condition without any infection or abnormality. Any problem at any part of the structure will cause hearing problem and the impairment faced by the individual depend on the severity of the hearing problem.