2021 Volume 64 Issue 1 Pages 69-77
The aim of this study was to clarify the effects of hearing aid use on frailty. The subjects were 64 outpatients of a hearing clinic aged 60 years old or older who had no previous history of use of hearing aids. We evaluated the patients' performance on the Kihon Checklist (KCL) before and about 6 months after the subjects started to use hearing aids. There was no significant change in the overall KCL score after the subjects started to use hearing aids. The response to only one question of the KCL, namely, “Do you travel in buses or trains?” showed significant improvement after the subjects had started to use hearing aids. We comparatively analyzed the characteristics (age, sex, average thresholds of the better hearing ear, speech recognition, KCL score, and patient-related consultation) between the KCL-improved and non-improved groups, and found that higher KCL scores and better hearing before the start of hearing aid use were significantly associated with improvement of the KCL score. We also comparatively analyzed the characteristics between the KCL-worsened and non-worsened groups, which revealed no significant differences. Hearing aid use had no effect on the overall degree of frailty, however, improvement of one item of IADL was observed, and there was one patient who showed improvement from frail to robust after they started using hearing aids. Therefore, hearing aid use is considered as one of the approaches for the elderly with hearing impairment and frailty.
