A major health concern, hearing loss affects nearly 34.5 million Americans. Diabetic hearing loss is believed to be caused by high blood glucose levels, which damage the blood vessels and nerves in the inner ear. The National Institute of Health (NIH), National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), and National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD) found that hearing loss is two times as common in people with diabetes and in a study done by Dutch researches in two health clinics, 19.7% of diabetes patients used hearing aids compared with 2.3% of those without diabetes. In people with pre-diabetes the instance of hearing loss is 30% higher than among people with normal blood glucose levels. A gradual process, hearing loss can often go unnoticed by those who have it.

Sensorineural Diabetic Hearing Loss

The most common form of hearing loss and that found …