Affiliation:
1. Audiology Department, Russian Medical Academy of Continuous Professional Education, Moscow 125040, Russia
Abstract
Background: Hearing loss is a significant public problem affecting 466 million people worldwide. Hearing-impaired persons benefit from the use of hearing aids, but the need is unmet in 85% of the global population. For the Russian population, no data have been found on this issue. The purpose of this study is to estimate the prevalence of hearing aid use in the Russian adult population. Methods: data on hearing aid use and self-reported trouble with hearing were obtained from the open access database of the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey—Higher School of Economics (RLMS-HSE) for the years 1994–2021. Results: the prevalence of hearing aid use in Russian adults ranged from 4.3 per 1000 (95% CI 3.2–5.9) to 8.8 per 1000 (95% CI 7.5–10.2). The mean rate of self-reported trouble with hearing was 22.2% (SD 0.8); of them, 2.2% (SD 0.2) used hearing aids, and it strongly correlated with older age (r = 0.889) and more severe hearing issues (r = 0.938). Conclusions: The overall prevalence of hearing aid use in Russian adults is very low with unmet needs in 98% of the cases of self-reported trouble with hearing, which is worse than in other populational studies and global estimates. The RLMS-HSE can be used for the monitoring of the national hearing health care system.
Subject
Podiatry,Otorhinolaryngology
Reference38 articles.
1. World Health Organization (2021). World Report on Hearing, World Health Organization.
2. Nordvik, Ø., Laugen Heggdal, P.O., Brännström, J., Vassbotn, F., Aarstad, A.K., and Aarstad, H.J. (2018). Generic quality of life in persons with hearing loss: A systematic literature review. BMC Ear Nose Throat Disord., 18.
3. Education, employment and independent living of young adults who are deaf and hard of hearing;Appelman;Am. Ann. Deaf,2012
4. Understanding listening-related fatigue: Perspectives of adults with hearing loss;Davis;Int. J. Audiol.,2021
5. A review of the impact of hearing interventions on social isolation and loneliness in older people with hearing loss;Ellis;Eur. Arch. Otorhinolaryngol.,2021