University of Florida researchers have discovered a link between healthy eating habits and your hearing.
Researcher Christopher Spankovich, Ph.D., examined the eating habits of participants in a recent national survey. Previously, Spankovich found that the higher a person scored on the survey’s Healthy Eating Index, the better his or her auditory function.
As part of a survey of 2,366 people, participants were given a four-part hearing test. When Spankovich analyzed the data, he found a strong connection among diet, hearing and noise exposure. 
The hearing of people who ate well but had higher noise exposure was comparable to the hearing of people with lower noise exposure who ate poorer diets, according to results published recently in the International Journal of Audiology. While eating healthfully may not reverse hearing damage, a good diet may play a part in prevention.
“Our hearing health seems to be strongly linked to our general health. Our auditory system is dependent on our cardiovascular, neural and metabolic health, and if we are not healthy in general, it seems to follow that we could increase our susceptibility to hearing loss,” said Spankovich.
In the study, a healthy diet meant that the person who scored well on the Healthy Eating Index ate as close to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s diet recommendations as possible. This means they ate plenty of vegetables, fruit and fiber while keeping salt, cholesterol, fat and saturated fat beneath the limits recommended by the Department of Agriculture.
Eating a healthy diet is a valuable idea in many respects. Dr. Dena at the Peninsula Hearing Center suggests adding a regular hearing checkup to your healthy routine as well. Contact us for an appointment today.