Using a hearing aid can help ward off dementia and prevent falls
By Wendy Haaf
New research confirms something scientists have suspected for some time: using hearing aids soon after hearing loss is diagnosed offers some protection against a number of ills.
In a US study published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, researchers pored over health insurance data on nearly 115,000 people aged 66 or older with hearing loss. Compared with those whose hearing loss was left untreated, people who began using hearing aids soon after diagnosis had slightly lower rates of diagnosis of first-time depression or anxiety (11% lower) and dementia (18% lower), and had lower incidences of fall-related injuries within three years (13% lower).
The protective effect of hearing aids remained nearly as robust even after accounting for a number of other possible contributing factors.
Photo: iStock/Daisy-Daisy.
