It’s well-known that hearing loss is a common manifestation of aging. In fact, up to one-third of all older adults have already been diagnosed with hearing loss. At the same time, because a longer lifespan increases your risk of accidents, diseases, and exposure to loud noises, the chances of developing hearing loss increase with age. Unfortunately, hearing loss among seniors has been credited with causing other serious health concerns. This includes a more rapid cognitive decline and higher rates of depressive ideation.
That said, studies have found that hearing loss may pose an even more dangerous and immediate health and safety risk for older adults in the form of heightened vulnerability to falling. In light of this, the role of hearing aids as interventions is becoming even more critical.
The connection between hearing loss and fall risks
On average, about one in three Americans aged 65 and older falls annually. Similarly, the same number of adults between 65 and 74 have hearing loss. According to health experts, these identical statistics are evidence of a link between the two. Specifically, UT Southwestern’s Otolaryngology Clinic notes that less common inner ear diseases can also impact balance. Research has even found mild hearing loss increases a person’s chances of falling threefold. On top of this, poor sensory abilities impair spatial awareness. As such, people with hearing loss may be more prone to tripping over their surroundings. Should hearing loss already be to such a degree that cognition is affected, that can further increase the chances of a fall as reflexes may be slower.
For older adults, falls can cause considerable injuries, such as fractures, dislocations, and lacerations. In worst-case scenarios, nasty falls can even be fatal. Since many seniors are also diagnosed with at least one chronic condition that requires consistent medication, health complications from falls can also occur. For instance, if a senior with hypertension falls over, their blood thinners can result in excessive bleeding internally and externally. With this information, health practitioners have, thus, surmised that hearing aids can drastically help in fall prevention among older adults.
How hearing aids can help and what seniors need
In a nutshell, hearing aids are medical devices that amplify sound, improving how and what a wearer hears. With this, they are often widely prescribed to those with mild to moderate hearing loss. Despite this, hearing aids are not as common among older adults as expected. A National Health and Aging Trends Study in 2021 determined that only 29% of seniors with hearing loss regularly wore their aids. This is due to cost, appearance, and usability. Generally, hearing aids can cost a person thousands of dollars because most insurers don’t cover them. Because hearing aids are often associated with elderly people, some older adults prefer to avoid them for fear of experiencing ageism. Finally, most hearing aid designs today are smaller and more complex, which can be hard to navigate for seniors.
With this in mind, seniors must be introduced to more accessible hearing aids. Considering that vision impairments are also a normal part of aging, using advanced hearing solutions is a viable option. Nuance’s hearing aid glasses are much easier to manage and keep track of. Unlike traditional hearing aids that are easy to lose or hard to handle for those with joint problems, these have integrated an over-the-counter hearing aid into the frames. Users can use an intuitively designed app to calibrate the glasses to their desired settings. This means there is less need to make complicated adjustments regularly. Since they also look and work like regular prescription glasses, they won’t stand out, empowering seniors to see and hear more clearly while feeling more confident.
Another solution that may help seniors with hearing loss is accessories for those around them, like clip-on microphones. Available from manufacturers like GN ReSound, which also creates remote controls for hearing aids, these microphones can be programmed to feed sound directly into a person’s assistive device. Using this, an older adult won’t feel too pressured to constantly fiddle with their aids to hear what those around them say. Crisper and more direct sounds also help them get their bearings, which can further stimulate the brain to prevent falling. Lastly, older adults may wish to consider self-coiling cochlear implants. Developed by UT Southwestern, these innovative implants feature a microphone and sound processor behind the ear to pick up sounds, with a receiver implanted under the skin, converting the sound signals into electrical components. The electrodes implanted in the inner ear then coil 360 degrees around the cochlea, customizing the fit perfectly to the patient and avoiding structural trauma, scarring, and signal issues associated with the rod-like electrodes found in regular cochlear implants. Even if an older adult doesn’t have severe hearing loss, these self-coiling cochlear implants can significantly improve how much they understand what people are saying.
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