Doctors' Notes: Hearing Loss
What's Up Docs?
BBC
4.4 • 659 Ratings
🗓️ 16 December 2025
⏱️ 31 minutes
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Summary
Drs Chris and Xand continue their conversation about hearing loss with Prof Doris Bamiou, Professor of Neuroaudiology at the UCL Ear Institute, and Honorary Consultant in Audiological Medicine at the University College London Hospitals.
Chris and Xand want to know how cognitive processing of sound works, what audio processing disorder is, why it happens, how it is diagnosed, and the external factors like neurodivergence and age that interact with it. They also examine the popular earplugs that filter speech, including whether they actually help with audio processing and how to use them responsibly, and hear Prof Bamiou’s personal and clinical perspective on hearing loss.
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Presenters: Drs Chris and Xand van Tulleken Guest: Prof Doris Bamiou Producer: Jo Rowntree Executive Producer: Rami Tzabar Editor: Kirsten Lass Assistant Producer: Maia Miller-Lewis Researcher: Mili Ostojic Tech Lead: Reuben Huxtable Social Media: Leon Gower Digital Lead: Richard Berry Composer: Phoebe McFarlane Sound Design: Melvin Rickarby
At the BBC: Assistant Commissioner: Greg Smith Commissioning Editor: Rhian Roberts
A Loftus Media production for BBC Radio 4.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds |
| 0:02.2 | Music Radio Podcasts |
| 0:04.6 | I like when a manager wears a suit and tides, you know what I mean? |
| 0:09.7 | In 2025, we were here for the football. |
| 0:13.0 | The Wayne Rooney Show |
| 0:14.0 | As a manager, you're making decisions on what you're seeing on the pitch. |
| 0:16.9 | Sometimes it doesn't always pay off. |
| 0:18.3 | Football daily. |
| 0:19.4 | Loyalty in football. Does it still exist? There football daily loyalty in football does it still exist |
| 0:21.8 | there is no loyalty in football and tunie and russo do you feel like the pressure actually helps |
| 0:26.9 | you play the best football we've prepared ourselves to step out onto the pitch at the end of the day |
| 0:31.2 | get the best of 2025 with podcasts on bbcc sounds hello welcome to's Notes. I'm Dr. Chris Van Tiliken, as ever. I'm with Dr. Zand, who is down the line because his baby still hasn't arrived. I mean, it's not the baby's fault. It's not, don't make it sound. I mean, it's not like a train where the train hasn't arrived. Several days from the due date. It's just that I don't want to miss it. |
| 0:57.3 | Yes. Well, no, and nor should you. But that is nice of you because you could very reasonably go, look, come on, your wife Dolly isn't in labour. Get on down to the studio. So I do appreciate everyone bearing with me yet again |
| 1:12.4 | while I wait at home for something to happen. We have just finished recording an interview with |
| 1:17.5 | Professor Doris Bermil. She is a professor of neuroaudiology at UCL at the Ear Institute. |
| 1:23.8 | And she took us through the science of hearing, the difference between hearing and listening, and the cocktail party problem, where as you lose your hearing, cocktail parties seem to get louder and it becomes harder to pay attention to the person in front of you. |
| 1:40.5 | That was the main app. |
| 1:42.1 | Zandi, what are we going to talk about now in doctor's notes? Because she was |
| 1:44.5 | very nice and she stayed with us for a deeper dive. So Doris is an expert in auditory processing |
| 1:50.4 | disorder, which I think is, you know, this is quite new science, looking at the ways in which |
| 1:57.3 | neurodivergence arises in different people. And part of that may be different |
| 2:01.6 | sensory processing and also the ways in which different aspects of neurodivergence can overlap. |
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