Can a Cold Impact Hearing Test Results?

Colds are an all-too common part of life, with adults usually getting these at least twice a year. Children can have them much more often. While these aren’t anything major, they could get in the way of quite a few things beyond your daily life. When you’re seeing an audiologist and need to get a hearing test, they can be more of an issue than you’d expect.

Can a cold impact a hearing test and its results? In short, yes, but it can be a little more complicated than that. It’s worth taking a look at how a cold affects your hearing, and what kind of impact it has on hearing test results.

Four Ways a Cold Impacts Your Hearing

Before diving into whether a cold impacts hearing tests results, it’s worth looking at how it can affect your hearing overall. In general, it affects your hearing in four common ways. These are:

• Ringing in your ears: A cold or flu can cause ringing in your ear, also known as tinnitus. For most people, this only lasts as long as they experience the cold or flu, but sometimes lasts for up to a week afterward.
• More severe illnesses: Sometimes, a cold or flu results in a more severe illness, with this often impacting your hearing. You’ll have a lower immune response, so it could end up causing ear infections and similar conditions, with these impacting your hearing.
• Congestion: Your ears are included in this, and your ear canals could get blocked up. That’ll result in either it being harder to hear, or you experiencing a clicking sound during the day. It usually clears up after the cold is gone, though.
• Lasting symptoms: Not all symptoms of a cold go away when the cold is gone. Some could last for weeks afterward, and these could also involve temporary or permanent hearing loss.

All of this could be more of an impact than you would’ve expected, and it can often be a confusing process. It could even end up making you think you’re experiencing another condition on top of your cold.

Can a Cold Impact Hearing Test Results?

Now it’s time to ask, can a cold impact hearing test results? As you might’ve guessed, it’ll have more of an impact than most people would’ve thought. In many cases, it could end up leading to false positives. The test could end up saying you have long-term tinnitus when you’re simply experiencing the symptoms of a cold.

For that reason, it’s not worth seeing an audiologist and getting hearing tests done when you have a cold or for several weeks afterward. That way, you can make sure the test results are as accurate as possible.

When To See an Audiologist

So, when should you see an audiologist if you’re worried about your hearing health? Generally, when you’re feeling healthy in almost every way, but are worried about your hearing. Make sure you don’t experience a cold or anything else when you get to your appointment.