Highlights
- •Male gender, age, functional and cognitive status, and depressive symptoms are associated with consistency between self-reported hearing disability and clinician-evaluated hearing status.
- •Elderly individuals with self-reported hearing disability are more likely to undergo subsequent functional and cognitive decline, and to experience depression.
- •Elderly subjects unaware of their hearing problems could be exposed to adverse consequences when they are informed of a hearing problem.
- •When clinicians inform those who are unaware of their hearing problems they should recommend interventions in order to prevent a negative impact of awareness of hearing loss.
Abstract
Objective
Hearing loss is a common chronic condition in elderly people. The prevalence of disabling
hearing loss among the elderly worldwide is 33% and in Italy ranges from 0.6% (profound
hearing loss) to 39% (mild hearing loss). We investigated the relationship between
self-reported hearing disability and clinician-evaluated hearing status, and its longitudinal
consequences in relation to cognitive impairment and functional decline. We hypothesised
that subjects who report that they have a hearing disability have a worse functional
and cognitive profile than people who do not report having a hearing disability.
Methods
We analysed 1171 participants in the InveCe.Ab study, a longitudinal population-based
study. We evaluated whether self-reported hearing disability was consistent with clinician-evaluated
hearing status (using the Whispered Voice Test; WVT), categorizing this variable as:
unaware of hearing loss (UHL), aware of hearing loss (AHL), only subjective hearing
loss (OSHL), without hearing loss (noHL). We also examined its relationship with various
population characteristics, and its long-term effects on functional and cognitive
performance and depressive symptoms.
Results
At baseline, hearing loss was found in 13.6% (95% CI: 11.7–15.7) of the participants
[17.6% (95% CI: 12.0–24.4) AHL; 82.4% (95% CI: 75.6–88) UHL], while 2.3% (95% CI:
1.4–3.4) of the subjects with normal WVT hearing status had OSHL. Male gender, age,
functional and cognitive performance, and depressive symptoms were associated with
consistency between self-reported hearing disability and WVT hearing status. Longitudinal
analysis revealed worsening functional performance and selective attention, global
cognitive deterioration, and depressive symptoms in the AHL group.
Conclusions
Our results showed that awareness of hearing disability in the elderly has adverse
cognitive and functional consequences over time. When clinicians inform those who
are unaware of their hearing problems, they should arrange for prompt referral not
only for audiometric evaluation but also for counselling in order to prevent a negative
impact of awareness of hearing loss.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: December 12, 2018
Accepted:
December 10,
2018
Received in revised form:
December 7,
2018
Received:
November 19,
2018
Identification
Copyright
© 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
