Can vitamins and minerals prevent hearing loss?
About 10 million people in the United States alone—from troops returning from war to students with music blasting through headphones—are suffering from impairing noise-induced hearing loss. The rising trend is something that researchers and physicians at the University of Michigan Kresge Hearing Research Institute are hoping to reverse, with a cocktail of vitamins and the mineral magnesium that has shown promise as a possible way to prevent hearing loss caused by loud noises. The nutrients were successful in laboratory tests, and now researchers are testing whether humans will benefit as well. “The prevention of noise induced hearing loss is key,” says Glenn E. Green, M.D., assistant professor of otolaryngology at the U-M Health System and director of the U-M Children’s Hearing Laboratory. “When we can’t prevent noise-induced hearing loss through screening programs and use of hearing protection, then we really need to come up with some way of protecting people who are still going to ha
