Forty years on: a new national study of hearing in England and implications for global hearing health policy

Abstract

Objective

We aimed to update the prevalence estimates of hearing loss in older adults in England using a nationally representative sample of adults aged 50 years old and older.

Design

A comparative cross-sectional study design was implemented. Hearing loss was defined as ≥35 dB HL at 3.0 kHz, as measured via Hearcheck in the better-hearing ear.

Study sample

We compared the estimates based on the English census in 2015 to estimates from psychoacoustic hearing data available for 8,263 participants in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) Wave 7 (2014–2015).

Results

Marked regional variability in hearing loss prevalence was revealed among participants with similar age profiles. The regional differences in hearing outcomes reached up to 13.53% in those belonging to the 71–80 years old group; the prevalence of hearing loss was 49.22% in the North East of England (95%CI 48.0–50.4), versus 35.69% in the South East (95%CI 34.8–36.50).

Conclusion

A socio-spatial approach in planning sustainable models of hearing care based on the actual populations’ needs and not on age demographics might offer a viable opportunity for healthier lives. Regular assessment of the extent and causality of the population’s different audiological needs within the country is strongly supported.

Keywords:

• Demographics/epidemiology
• ELSA
• hearing health inequalities
• health geography

Acknowledgements

DT thanks Amy Craddock, Research and Policy Officer at the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID), for the collaboration in summarising the prevalence of hearing loss at ≥35 dB HL in Hearing in Adults study, including the table reference (provided as Table 1).

Ethics approval

Ethical approval for all the ELSA Waves was granted from the National Research and Ethics Committee (MREC/01/2/91).

Informed consent from participants

Written informed consent was obtained from all participants. Details of the ELSA study design, sample and data collection are available at the ELSA’s project website (https://www.elsa-project.ac.uk/).

Author contributions

DT was responsible for the conceptualisation, and all authors were responsible for developing the design of the study. DT was responsible for conducting the analyses and mapping, interpreting the results, and drafting the manuscript. DT, MP, and EK critically revised the manuscript. All authors have read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The English Longitudinal Study of Ageing dataset is available via the UK Data Service (http://www.ukdataservice.ac.uk). Statistical code is available from the corresponding author upon request at [email protected].

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the Institute for Health Policy and Organisation (IHPO) at The University of Manchester. The views expressed are those of the research team and not necessarily those of the IHPO, The University of Manchester, the NIHR, or the Department of Health and Social Care.