Ringing In Only One Ear: Is That Serious?

If you’ve noticed ringing in only one ear, it’s natural to worry. When something feels lopsided in the body, the mind goes straight to “what’s wrong on that side?” So let’s get some facts straight, and let’s look at what would be serious and what isn’t serious at all.

It feels like your ear, but it’s happening in your brain

You feel tinnitus in your ear because that’s where your brain has always experienced the sensation of hearing. But tinnitus isn’t actually happening in the ear. It’s happening in the brain. Even when it’s perceived on one side, the sound is generated in the brain.

Tinnitus begins when the brain picks up a change in hearing and starts searching for the sound it’s no longer receiving. That change doesn’t have to be hearing damage. It can be any change in hearing, even a temporary one. Say you catch a cold and it affects one ear more than the other. That ear can feel almost deaf, when really it’s simply clogged and going through a short stretch of hearing less. That’s one ordinary reason the ringing might seem to sit on one side. The brain is a funny place, and sometimes it simply seems to put the sound in one ear.

Tinnitus itself is benign

Tinnitus is always a benign body sensation. That isn’t to say it isn’t bothersome. It can be very bothersome. But benign means it isn’t a sign of a greater illness, so it isn’t serious in the medical sense. Ringing in what feels like one ear is very often just ordinary, garden-variety tinnitus, and it’s no cause for alarm.

What tinnitus can do is occur alongside other health situations that need a medical professional. Those are what we want to know about.

When to get checked, and how soon

Sudden hearing loss is an emergency. If the hearing in one or both ears suddenly drops, get it looked at right away, the same day. Go to an ENT (an ear, nose and throat doctor) if you can, or to an emergency room.

Other neurological signs need a doctor right away too: facial weakness, slurred speech, changes in your vision, a severe headache, or severe dizziness.

Hearing loss in one ear (sometimes called single-sided deafness) should be looked at by an ENT. It isn’t an emergency unless it came on suddenly, and it’s probably still not serious, but it’s always worth having a look. Often that involves a hearing test with an audiologist. A clear difference in hearing between the ears does raise the chance of something called an acoustic neuroma, a growth on the nerve that carries hearing and balance. Let me calm you here: acoustic neuromas are very rare, and they are not cancer. Because one can grow slowly over time and press on nearby nerves, it’s worth letting an ENT check, and the ENT decides whether an MRI is needed.

Ringing in one ear, with hearing that seems the same in both ears: no rush. You don’t need an ENT or an MRI for that. A routine hearing test is part of good care, but it isn’t urgent. It’s simply a check that both ears are hearing alike, because a slow difference between the ears can be hard to notice on your own. It’s a test, not a sales appointment, and nothing needs to be bought. If the test shows a difference between the ears, that’s when an ENT takes a look.

Fullness or a blocked feeling that doesn’t clear, from a cold for example, is worth seeing your doctor about.

Making good choices about your next steps

Sending people off for tests they don’t need costs them time, money and a great deal of stress, and it adds to the strain on the medical system. Accurate education helps you tell the difference between a test or a doctor’s visit you really need and one you don’t, like an expensive MRI for tinnitus on its own.

Here’s an example of a real reason to see an audiologist. After learning what tinnitus is, you might start to notice that you often ask people to repeat themselves, or that you’re joining in less in situations you used to enjoy, because you can’t follow what people are saying. That’s 100% a great reason to see an audiologist. Today’s hearing aids are just phenomenal, and there’s no reason not to get the hearing support you need.

But many people with tinnitus hear quite well in their day-to-day lives. There’s nothing there to fix, yet they hear the ringing. For them, the bother has much more to do with an alert, vigilant brain that picked up on a body sensation, locked onto it, and wrapped stories around it, than with any hearing problem. That’s the part we can work on: the fear, the anxiety and the misinformation that keep tinnitus in the foreground.

Once you’re educated and the fire has gone down a little, you can take a deep breath. You’ll start to see that you have a lot of choices in front of you. The more accurate information you have, the better the choices you can make to plot your path ahead.

The sound is real. The danger is not. Your brain can learn the difference.