I am 77 and have had reflux problems all my life.
70 years ago, at the age of 6, I had my ears syringed weekly to no effect, followed by tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy. My hearing was still below par but I got used to it and managed to function OK in life.
50 years ago, in my 20’s, I was really keen on sub aqua swimming and aced all the tests to continue my hobby apart from my ears which showed damage from the syringing when I was an infant.
Recently, noticing my hearing was getting worse, I had them tested to find I had “profound hearing loss” in both ears. But, although I live in UK and this is all provided “free at the point of need” by our excellent NHS, My ENT appointments were with a franchised group bought up by a US company.
The first ENT consultant I saw did not believe hearing loss could be caused by reflux (even though I could have pointed to a dozen papers and my own research, but I don’t argue with “specialists”). I should have smelled a rat when he told me I needed to buy a “Sinus Rinse” that wasn’t available on NHS. I told him I rinsed my sinuses by snorting tap water from my cupped palm when necessary, which I’d been told to do by a proper NHS ENT years ago. He was alarmed and said I needed the “isotonics”. (My background is in science and I know what the term actually means and how it’s been hijacked as a marketting ploy to sell energy drinks etc.) That should have been a second occasion for rat smelling!
I did buy the product he told me to. It was very expensive for a small plastic squeezy bottle and a few sachets containing half a teaspoonful of table salt (but it’s sold by an American company). Instructions were to purify water to use by boiling it first and I had to buy a new kit every 3 months! None of that, of course, was necessary for 2 reasons:
1, Our tap water is sufficiently clean.
2, My eustachian tubes were perfectly clear.
I complained to the company and was seen by another ENT who agreed with me that reflux can indeed cause hearing loss. He agreed snorting tap water (in UK) was perfectly adequate. He arranged hearing aids which I now have (“free” thanks to the NHS) and I can hear clearer tan I have all my life.
But he also explained what the damage was the syringing had done 70 years before. It had caused my eardrums to become concave and the ossicles (fine bones of the middle ear) to become partially fused. (Possibly otosclerosis?)