A-List Celebrities You Didn't Know had Hearing Loss & Tinnitus

Hi guys. Cliff Olson, Doctor of Audiology and founder of Applied Hearing Solutions in Phoenix, Arizona. And in this video I'm talking about eight popular celebrities who have hearing loss and tinnitus. Coming up!

You would be shocked at how many celebrities have hearing loss or tinnitus since these are conditions that you cannot see. You may never even know that your favorite actor, actress, movie star, or president actually has them. However, these larger than life personalities are just like you and me, which means that they are still susceptible to losing their hearing and developing tinnitus just like the rest of us. But before I share who these eight celebrities are, if you could do me a huge favor and click the like button, it really helps out my channel because it gets these videos in front of a bigger audience. And while you're at it, if you have not yet hit that subscribe button with notification bell, go ahead and do that as well, because that ensures that you never miss one of my newly released videos and I release multiple new videos every single week.

That being said, I really appreciate it and also go ahead and get into who these celebrities are starting with. Celebrity number one, Millie Bobby Brown. Millie Bobby Brown rose to stardom by playing seven in the Stranger Things series on Netflix. Millie has single-sided deafness, meaning that she is deaf in one ear, but can still hear in her other ear. While on a movie set she often needs an assistant to say "Action" really loud so she knows when to start her scene. This leads me to believe that she may also have a genetic hearing loss in her better hearing ear as well. Clearly having a hearing loss has not negatively impacted her acting career or her education because she continues to star in big movies and she is enrolled at Purdue University. She has never mentioned whether or not she uses BiCROS hearing aid treatment, but if not, this would be an easy way for her to significantly improve her hearing ability, even with one ear being completely deaf.

The second celebrity on this list is actress Halle Berry. Halle Berry is an extremely popular American actress who has starred in a ton of movies over the course of her career. According to Halle, her hearing loss was caused by a domestic violence incident. In one interview, she mentioned that a physical blow to her left ear caused a puncture in that eardrum causing her hearing loss. Typically, ruptured eardrums either heal on their own or can be surgically repaired, but this does not appear to be the case for Halle. While this is extremely unfortunate, there are treatment options for this type of hearing loss, including either traditional hearing aids or a bone anchored hearing aid. If you or anyone you know is a victim of domestic abuse, please call the National Domestic Abuse Hotline at (800) 799-7233. The third celebrity on this list is singer Will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas. Will.i.am has been vocal about his tinnitus, which is a constant perceived ringing or buzzing even in the absence of sound.

However, he also indicated that he has a proper hearing loss as indicated by his threshold curves during several hearing tests. Since tinnitus is often caused by hearing loss, it is no surprise that he has both hearing loss and tinnitus together. It is unknown whether or not these conditions were caused by loud noise exposure from music, but that is highly likely. Fortunately, hearing loss and tinnitus caused by noise exposure are typically very easy to treat with the use of properly fit and programmed hearing aids that can improved hearing and reduce the perception of tinnitus in most cases. The fourth celebrity on this list is one from back in the day, it's actor and former president Ronald Reagan. Back in 1939, while on a film set, a 0.38 caliber pistol was fired in close proximity to Ronald Reagan's right ear, which was the onset of his hearing loss.

What you may not realize is that President Ronald Reagan was probably one of the biggest influencers of public hearing aid use. Once his use of hearing aids was announced publicly in 1983, hearing aid sales skyrocketed by 30% in a single quarter, back when hearing aid adoption rates were only 2.4%. In fact, Ronald Reagan is even responsible for May being Better Hearing and Speech Month, raising awareness across the United States for hearing loss since speech disorders. Chances are, if Ronald Reagan had never worn hearing aids, hearing aid adoption rates could possibly still be around 2.4% like they were back in 1982 instead of over 34% like it is today. The fifth celebrity on this list is another United States President, Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton was first hit with hearing aids at the young age of 51 proving that hearing aids are not just for older people. Bill Clinton has a high frequency hearing loss that negatively impacts his ability to get clarity from speech and hear in background noise situations.

Fortunately, through the use of properly fit and programmed hearing aids, it is possible to replace these missing high frequency speech sounds to significantly improve the clarity of speech, not only in quiet situations, but in background noise situations as well. The sixth celebrity on this list is Academy Award-winning actor Troy Kotsur. Troy Kotsur won an Oscar for best supporting actor in the movie CODA. He lost his hearing as a child and learned sign language as his primary form of communication. Oftentimes, being completely deaf in both ears means that hearing aids would provide little to no benefit. In these cases, either learning a form of sign language or a cochlear implant is the only way to restore communication capabilities. However, which route you decide to go will heavily depend on which form of communication you would prefer, as well as the social dynamics of your community. Either way, actor Troy Kotsur is proof that you do not need to be able to hear to have a happy and successful life.

The seventh celebrity on this list is MythBusters star Adam Savage. A few years ago, Adam talked on his YouTube channel about his congenital hearing loss that he stresses was not caused by all of the explosions on his popular Discovery Channel TV show. His hearing loss affects all of the frequencies in his hearing, including the low, mid, and high frequencies. He is a bilateral hearing aid user and he loves his hearing aids because not only do they amplify sounds for him to hear them better, but he can also use his smartphone app to adjust the program settings of his devices. Adam is the perfect role model for techie individuals who want to not only treat their hearing loss, but turn their hearing loss into a superpower through the use of advanced hearing aid technology. And the eighth and final celebrity that I'm going to be talking about in this video is actress Jodie Foster.

While it is unlikely that Jodie had a hearing loss back in her Coppertone sunblock commercial days, Jodie Foster has worn hearing aids in both of her ears for a number of years at this point. However, the Academy Award winning actress from The Silence of the Lambs also suffers from vertigo or dizziness, which suggests that she may have a condition called Meniere's Disease. Meniere's Disease typically develops later in life and can cause fluctuating hearing loss, vertigo, and tinnitus, which means that you need to stay on top of your hearing loss treatment. Now, there are a ton of other celebrities who have hearing loss and tinnitus, some of them including Pete Townsend from The Who, Dave Grohl from the Foo Fighters, NFL football player Derek Coleman, actresses Jane Lynch, Marlee Matlin, and Whoopi Goldberg, and even comedian Steven Colbert. But if I share details on every celebrity who has hearing loss or tinnitus, then this video would never end.

The point is, if your favorite celebrities don't let hearing loss and tinnitus hold them back, neither should you. Do exactly like they did. If you think you have hearing loss or tinnitus, go and get it evaluated by a hearing care professional so you can get a proper treatment recommendation so it doesn't affect your life either. That's it for this video. If you have any questions, leave them in the comment section below. If you like the video, please share it. If you wanna see other videos just like this one, go ahead and hit that subscribe button. Also, feel free to check up my website, HearingUp.com.