Analysis of Necessity and Adequateness of Hearing Rehabilitations in Hearing Impaired Persons / 대한이비인후과학회지

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Hearing impairment is a common problem that increases significantly with age and hearing impaired persons need enough and proper medical and social services. We aimed to assess the present status of hearing rehabilitation services and measure the satisfaction of hearing impaired persons in their living. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: We selected a total of 60 persons by stratified randomized systemic sampling from hearing handicapped persons pre-registered with the Ministry of Health and Welfare. There were 32 males and 28 females with the mean age of 54.0+/-17.7 years. We checked the hearing handicap inventory (HHI), articulation index (AI), and visual analogue scale (VAS) of subjects. RESULTS: From 60 subjects, 35 subjects (58.3%) needed hearing aid and 13 subjects (21.7%) needed cochlear implantation. Thirty six subjects (60.0%) were classified into group 4 and 5 in HHI and the mean VAS score was 4.0+/-2.5. Among the 40 subjects with hearing aid, only 7 subjects (17.5%) had a proper device of hearing rehabilitation. In addition, no subjects had cochlear implantation (CI) even though they needed it. CONCLUSION: From this study, most hearing impaired persons had difficulties in every day living and had emotional problems. The low rate of proper hearing rehabilitation suggested that clinicians have to be concerned about providing hearing rehabilitation and expanding social and medical services for hearing impaired persons.