Hearing loss and dementia

What is dementia?

Dementia is a term used for a group of symptoms; It is not one specific disease. There are many different forms of dementia with the most commonly known being Alzheimer’s disease. Dementia can impact on a person’s thinking, behaviour and their ability to perform certain day to day tasks, Understanding information, problem solving, memory, spatial skills, language skills and attention are all areas that can be affected. How dementia presents itself depends on the specific areas of the brain that are damaged.

Risk factors for dementia

o Cardiovascular disease

o Diabetes

o High Cholesterol

o Family history

o Head injury

o Hearing loss

Dementia and hearing loss [The technical stuff – what research says]

In a 2011 study conducted by Johns Hopkins National Institute on Aging, researchers discovered that seniors with hearing loss are significantly more likely to develop dementia over time than those who retain their hearing. The Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging – a long-term study tracking age-related health factors in individuals since 1958 – found that study participants with hearing loss at the beginning of the study were significantly more likely to develop dementia by the end. Compared to volunteers with normal hearing, those with hearing loss had a significantly higher risk of developing dementia over time. The more hearing loss they had, the higher their likelinood of developing the memory-robbing disease.

Further results suggested that the more severe the hearing loss, the greater the likelihood of developing dementia.

What can be done…?

Although the reason for the link between the two conditions is still not fully understood, there is enough evidence to support routinely screening and treating older adults for hearing loss. There is now some urgency to treating hearing loss rather than ignoring it, Dr Lin, a specialist in hearing loss and dementia, Stated “If you want to address hearing loss well…you want to do it sooner rather than later. If hearing loss is potentially contributing to these differences were seeing on MRI, you want to treat it before these brain structural changes take place.”

References

http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/hearing_loss_and_dementia_linked_in_study

http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/hearing_loss_linked_to_accelerated_brain_tissue_loss_

http://www.dementia.org/causes/connection-between-hearing-loss-and-dementia

https://fightdementia.org.au/about-dementia-and-memory-loss/about-dementia

http://www.minnesotamedicine.com/Past-Issues/Past-Issues-2012/January-2012/Hearing-Loss-and-Dementia-New-Insights

https://mandkehearing.com/hearing-health-details/2