Does hearing continue to deteriorate after exposure to noise stops?

I have hearing loss in my left ear as a result of loud noise I experienced as a youngster. I used to help my dad in the 1960's who was a parking lot contractor. I would put the rebar pins in the cement bumpers and he would come behind me with a jack hammer and pound them into the ground to hold the bumper into place. I also would move the wooden number stencils from each parking place to be painted by the paint machine that had a
go-kart engine that powered it and it was loud. My brother also helped out and he has the same hearing loss. We are now 50 years older but haven't got to the point of wearing hearing aides. I do have a really hard time in a room full of people and use closed caption on the TV about ½ the time.

If I understand your question, Ava, you are asking whether there is a difference between a one time exposure to very loud noise (explosion) and long term exposure to loud sounds (being in a combat zone or working in a very loud factory). If that is correct, from my limited knowledge in some circumstances our hearing can recover from a one time exposure (explosion). Sustained exposure to the loud noises are much harder on our bodies and brains. In most cases, this type of exposure can cause nerve damage. This coupled with other health issues may become progressive.
I sincerely ask you to speak to your hearing professional about this. There are many variables within each of the exposures you proposed that could affect the long term outcome. Please, talk to an Otolaryngologist or Audiologist and discuss the finer points of your question thoroughly.
Best, L

If I understand your question, Ava, you are asking whether there is a difference between a one time exposure to very loud noise (explosion) and long term exposure to loud sounds (being in a combat zone or working in a very loud factory). If that is correct, from my limited knowledge in some circumstances our hearing can recover from a one time exposure (explosion). Sustained exposure to the loud noises are much harder on our bodies and brains. In most cases, this type of exposure can cause nerve damage. This coupled with other health issues may become progressive.
I sincerely ask you to speak to your hearing professional about this. There are many variables within each of the exposures you proposed that could affect the long term outcome. Please, talk to an Otolaryngologist or Audiologist and discuss the finer points of your question thoroughly.
Best, L

i must ask again- because no one answer and a self-story is not an answer - sorry - Is there a difference, regarding the continued deterioration in hearing, between acoustic damage resulting from a sudden noise (explosion for example) and which has not disappeared,
And permanent acoustic sabotage after several years of exposure to noise and the hearing deterioration continues though slowly?

This information from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Center for Disease Control (CDC) may be of interest. https://www.hearingloss.org/hearing-help/hearing-loss-basics/prevention/

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

A major cause of hearing loss in our society is noise exposure. Tiny hair cells in the ear are damaged when assaulted by loud noise. Once those hair cells are destroyed they cannot be replaced.

How Loud is Too Loud?
According to NIDCD’s Noisy Planet website, “The impact of noise adds up over a lifetime. If you are exposed to loud sounds on a regular basis, your risk for permanent damage increases over time. Even a single but long-lasting loud event can cause damage. Limit your exposure to sounds at or above 100 decibels to no more than 15 minutes, and limit sounds that are at or above 110 decibels to no more than 1 minute.”

Watch this video by the CDC about how loud noise damages hair cells.

Repeated and lengthy exposure to loud sound – whether is it music or a jackhammer – will eventually produce a sensorineural hearing loss. See the NIDCD Listen Up! Inforgraphic (text version available). Also see the Dangerous Decibels’ Decibel Exposure Time Guidelines.

How to Reduce the Damage to Hearing from Noise
Your ears can be your warning system for potentially dangerous noises. The noise is too loud when:

You have to raise your voice to be understood by someone standing nearby
The noise hurts your ears
You develop a buzzing or ringing sound in your ears, even temporarily (indicates some hair cells have died)
You don’t hear as well as you normally do until several hours after you get away from the noise.
How to Protect Yourself When Around Loud Noise
Block the noise (wear earplugs or earmuffs)
Avoid the noise (put hands over ears if you can’t walk away)
Turn down the volume
Protecting Kids’ Hearing
Get your children involved in their own hearing health. For more resources, go to:

It’s a Noisy Planet: Protect Their Hearing, NIDCD, National Institutes of Health
Listen to Your Buds, American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
Turn it to the Left, American Academy of Audiology

all "clever" audiologists say that hearing loss stops after leaving a noisy envuronment. no one can bring academic papers about but I am sure that you may lose hearing more and more without any other variable but not so quickly as before. I need academic research and academic papers! I know other parameters of hearing loss but everyone who is in this kind of lossing- everyone is unique and not as another one. The academic base is needed. thanks

May I make a suggestion please? Academic papers are available to all of us via the wonders of the Internet.

Those of us communicating on Connect are all seekers of the best possible information we look for the science and research based information. As a participant and volunteer mentor in Lung Health and Joint & Bone Health groups I spend many hours finding, reading and sharing the best available information. Many other groups are enriched by the research efforts of their participants, since the world of health and disease is far too extensive for any one person to have answers to all the questions at their fingertips. I am also a person with hearing loss who worked in noisy environments, but I have no time for another research topic.

Would you possibly consider becoming a researcher of academic and scientific information about noise-induced hearing loss? When you find the specific information you are seeking, you could then share it with the rest of us. I am sure there are many of us who would be grateful.
Sue