May is Better Hearing and Speech Month
Better Hearing and Speech Month (BSHM) is a campaign founded in 1927 by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association to raise awareness about communication disorders including speech, language, literacy, and hearing loss.
The goal of BSHM is is to increase awareness about communication disorders, and the role of audiologists and speech-language pathologists in their assessment, diagnosis, treatment and management, education, research, and prevention.
Early identification and intervention for hearing loss is important. Many people live with unidentified hearing loss, often failing to realize that they are missing certain sounds and words. Checking one’s hearing is the first step toward addressing the issue.
The theme for 2022 is “Connecting People”.
According to the World Health Organization’s first World Report on Hearing:
- Noise is now being acknowledged as an important public health issue and a top environmental risk faced by the world today.
- Over 50% of people aged 12–35 years listen to music via personal audio devices at volumes that pose a risk to their hearing.
- A rule of thumb for staying safe is to keep the volume below 60%.
- If you frequently use personal audio devices around loud sounds: instead of turning the volume up, consider using noise-canceling earphones or headphones.
- Listening through personal audio devices should not exceed 80 dB (adults) or 75 dB (sensitive users: e.g., children) for 40 hours a week.
- Listeners who regularly use portable audio devices can expose themselves to the same level of sound in 15 minutes of music at 100 dB that an industrial worker would receive in an 8-hour day at 85 dB.
Hearing loss has often been referred to as an “invisible disability”, not just because of the lack of visible symptoms, but because it has long been stigmatized in communities and ignored by policymakers.
Unaddressed hearing loss is the third largest cause of years lived with disability globally. It affects people of all ages, as well as families and economies. An estimated US$1 trillion is lost each year due to our collective failure to adequately address hearing loss. While the financial burden is enormous, what cannot be quantified is the distress caused by the loss of communication, education, and social interaction that accompanies unaddressed hearing loss.
At least 46 million people in the United States have a hearing or other communication disorder. For these individuals, the basic components of communication—sensing, interpreting, and responding to people and things in their environment—can be challenging.
What makes this matter more pressing than ever is the fact that the number of people with hearing loss is likely to rise considerably in the coming decades. Over 1.5 billion people currently experience some degree of hearing loss, which could grow to 2.5 billion by 2050. In addition, 1.1 billion young people are at risk of permanent hearing loss from listening to music at loud volumes over prolonged periods of time. The World report on hearing shows that evidence-based and cost-effective public health measures can prevent many causes of hearing loss.
Relevance of Better Hearing and Speech Month
People need to communicate to perform tasks in many aspects of their lives: at school, at work, in health care settings, and during social and leisure activities. At work, your safety might depend on your ability to hear potential dangers in your environment, and your productivity might rely on your ability to clearly communicate your plans, progress, and concerns with your coworkers and supervisors. With the increased use of technology to work and communicate at a safe distance during the pandemic, overcoming communication challenges is more important now than ever before.
Millions of Americans experience a hearing disorder at some point in their life, especially as they grow older. Having trouble hearing can make it hard to understand and follow a supervisor’s instructions or a health care provider’s advice, respond to alarms and other warnings, and hear doorbells and phones. It can also complicate conversations with friends and family. People who work in noisy environments—such as factory or construction workers, road crews, musicians, and fitness instructors—can develop noise-induced hearing loss and tinnitus (a ringing, roaring, clicking, hissing, or buzzing in the ears) when ongoing or extreme noise exposure damages the tiny sensory hair cells in the inner ear that help transmit sound to the brain. Hearing problems can be frustrating, embarrassing, and even dangerous. A number of devices, including hearing aids and cochlear implants, can help.
In the U.S., an estimated 17.9 million adults report having a voice problem. Problems with your voice can significantly affect your ability to perform your job. Teachers, singers, lawyers, broadcast journalists, salespeople, and public speakers are among those at greatest risk for voice injury, such as hoarseness due to overuse. Rest your voice when you are sick. Avoid screaming or whispering. Other voice and speech conditions, including apraxia of speech, spasmodic dysphonia, and stuttering, can also affect your verbal expression and therefore your ability to communicate at work.
Communication disorders affecting language can also be detrimental to your work life. For example, the effects of specific language impairment (SLI), a communication disorder that interferes with the development of language skills in children, may persist into adulthood. With intervention, adults with SLI may develop strategies for managing symptoms and improving their daily work, family, and social interactions. Aphasia is a disorder affecting the ability to speak, write, and understand language. Aphasia is caused by brain damage, most often due to a stroke. Although people of any age can acquire aphasia, the disorder most commonly affects middle-aged and older adults. Because many adults with aphasia return to work, rehabilitation often focuses on developing or reestablishing skills for employment.
If you experience problems with your hearing, voice, speech, or language, you have options. You can reach out to your primary care doctor or a qualified health professional such as a speech-language pathologist, otolaryngologist (ear, nose, and throat doctor), or audiologist for early and appropriate care. You can also consider interventions for hearing, voice, speech, and language problems, such as hearing aids and assistive devices for hearing, voice, speech, and language disorders.
Determinants of Hearing Capacity
It is evident that many determining factors of the hearing capacity – genetic, biological, psychosocial, and environmental – experienced at different stages of life, influence the ears and can either lead to hearing loss or protect against it.
Many ear conditions, such as otitis media, are treatable, and many causes of hearing loss –nutrition, ear hygiene, and loud noise, for example –can be avoided by taking preventive actions at a personal level.
Both causative and preventive factors interplay to determine the occurrence, nature, severity, and progression of hearing loss, thus the hearing capacity of an individual is determined by:
- Baseline hearing capacity at birth
- Exposure to, or presence of, causative factors (genetic, biological, behavioral, environmental)
- Protective actions mitigating the risk factors
How To Protect Your Hearing
People often voluntarily expose themselves to loud sounds through their headphones or through the stereo system in concerts, nightclubs, sporting events, and even fitness classes.
- Protect your hearing when shooting a firearm. Those using firearms for recreational purposes would benefit from learning about their safe use, which includes but is not limited to the use of hearing protection.
- Is the noise too loud? If you need to shout to make yourself heard, then yes. And you need hearing protection such as earplugs or noise-canceling earmuffs.
- Do not listen to headphones for a long time. Turn the volume down and take periodic breaks from the noise.
Taking Care of Your Voice
- Drink plenty of water, especially when exercising.
- If you drink caffeinated beverages or alcohol, balance your intake with plenty of water.
- Take vocal naps—rest your voice throughout the day.
- Use a humidifier in your home. This is especially important in winter or in dry climates. Thirty percent humidity is recommended.
- Avoid or limit the use of medications that may dry out the vocal folds, including some common cold and allergy medications. If you have voice problems, ask your doctor which medications would be safest for you to use.
Sources:
https://www.cdc.gov/nceh/features/better-hearing-and-speech-month/index.html
https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/world-report-on-hearing
https://www.nidcd.nih.gov/news/2020/may-is-better-hearing-and-speech-month