A new report links wearing hearing aids to a lower risk of dying. The study, published Wednesday in The Lancet Healthy Longevity, found that adults who regularly wore their hearing aids had a 24% lower risk for dying compared to those who didn’t wear the devices.
“We found that adults with hearing loss who regularly used hearing aids had a 24% lower risk of mortality than those who never wore them,” Janet Choi, MD, an otolaryngologist at Keck Medicine and lead researcher said in a statement. “These results are exciting because they suggest that hearing aids may play a protective role in people’s health and prevent early death.”
Data came from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey between 1999 and 2012. Choi’s team looked at almost 10,000 adults over the age of 20. Of them, 1,863 were dealing with hearing loss. And of those with hearing loss, 237 wore hearing aids regularly (that is, at least once a week, five hours a week, or half the time) and 1,483 never wore the devices. After the people had hearing tests, they filled out questionnaires about their hearing aid use. The scientists followed up on their mortality status over the course of 10 years.
Even when researchers adjusted for severity of hearing loss, income, age, ethnicity, education and other factors, the findings were similar in that there was a lower risk for dying among those who wore their hearing aids.
In 2022, over-the-counter hearing aids came on the market but uptake hasn’t been as strong as some clinicians and manufacturers would like. A recent survey found a lot of people don’t understand the concept of OTC hearing aids or aren’t sure if they’ll help.
The news comes as a recent report found that about 65% of older adults have hearing loss and just 29% of them use hearing aids. Previous research has linked untreated hearing loss with falls, reduced cognitive decline and lower prevalence of dementia.
