Woman suffers from a rare condition meaning she can't hear men’s voices

Have you ever experienced a situation when you’re talking to someone and they don’t give you a response but if a woman talks to them they reply? It is pretty rare, but they might not be turning a deaf ear to you.

Because this literally happened to a woman, who could not hear her boyfriend and thought she had gone deaf. But it turned out that she had not gone deaf after all when she heard a woman speaking. Pretty confusing, isn’t it? Don’t worry, everything will be cleared up by the end of this article!

Deaf towards men

All was going well for this woman from the east coast of China, but that soon changed when she woke up one day and couldn’t hear a thing when her boyfriend spoke to her. As reported by Daily Mail in January 2019, she rushed to Qianpu Hospital but was left shocked when she heard everything the female doctor said.

Dr Lin Xiaoqing, a female ear, nose and throat specialist was in charge of treating the woman identified as ‘Chen’. Chen revealed that she was feeling under the weather and was experiencing nausea and dizziness the night before. She thought that getting a good night’s sleep would cure the illness but the next day it got progressively worse.

Why can’t she hear men’s voices?

The doctor diagnosed Chen with ‘reverse-slope hearing loss' also known as ‘low-frequency hearing loss’. Patients suffering from this condition are unable to hear low-pitched sounds, which men possess, as per Healthy hearing. However, the patient can hear women’s voices since their pitch is higher.

The doctor revealed that the condition progresses when the patient is under stress, however, it can also be passed down genetically. The woman also divulged that she had been under quite a lot of stress lately, and wasn’t getting enough sleep while working hard. The stress took a toll on her body and resulted in her hearing loss. However, after getting adequate treatment, Chen was on her way to recovery.

Sources used:

Daily Mail, 'Woman is unable to hear the voices of MEN - including her own boyfriend - and can only pick up the higher frequency tones of other females'

Healthy hearing, 'What is reverse-slope (low frequency) hearing loss?'

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