Hearing status of elderly people: study in a tertiary level hospital

A study was carried out from April 2003 to March 2004 at the Department of Otolaryngology and Head-Neck Surgery, BSMMU, with the aim to evaluate the prevalence of hearing loss and to find out the pattern and extent of hearing loss among the elderly people. The study included 100 people aged over 50 years. Out of 100 cases 59% were found with normal hearing and 41% had variable degree of hearing impairment. The highest prevalence of hearing impairment was found 100% in 9th decade with gradually decreasing tendency and lowest was 29.50% in 6th decade. Most of the cases were found to be bilateral (65.85%). Majority (65.85%) of the hearing impaired people had sensorineural type of loss with a significant number (21.95%) of conductive loss. Irrespective of type of impairment. Most of the people (73%) had no complaint of ear problem during presentation. Only 27% had some sorts of otological symptoms like hearing loss, tinnitus and vertigo and among them about 96.29% complained of hearing loss. About 44.44% of the hearing impaired person of 6th decade, showed mild hearing loss. In the 7th decade maximum (50%) had moderate to severe hearing loss. About 31% of persons of 8th decade and 50% of 9th decade had severe degree of hearing loss.