Can your diet protect you from hearing loss? Good question.

It turns out that diet is one of the few modifiable risk factors for age-related hearing loss.

The Blue Mountains Hearing Study, conducted in Australia, looked at whether diet can prevent or slow the development of age-related hearing loss.

Researchers found that people who had higher intakes of dietary omega-3 and who consumed fish on a weekly basis had a reduced risk (42%) of developing age-related hearing loss. There are many ways to load up on foods rich in omega-3 fatty acids.

In another article, published in the Journal of Nutrition, Health & Aging, the researchers from the Blue Mountains Hearing Study looked at dietary vitamin E and vitamin A intake.

They found that people who had diets rich in vitamin E and vitamin A also had a reduced risk of developing age-related hearing loss. There are a variety of foods high in vitamin E.

Study participants who had the highest dietary vitamin A intake had a 47% reduced risk of having moderate or greater hearing loss (>40 dB HL) compared to those who had the lowest intake. See here for foods high in vitamin A.