N.Z. slipping on hearing aids

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33739, 11 January 1975, Page 8

N.Z. slipping on hearing aids

New Zealand has not kept tip with advances in hearing-aid technology compared with those in overseas countries, although there was a time when New Zealand could claim to have led the way, says the secretary of the Society of Hearing Aid Audiologists (Mr R. D. Kneale) in submissions to the Minister of Health (Mr McGuigan). About 9 per cent of New Zealanders, or about 300,000 people, suffer from some impairment to their hearing, says Mr Kneale. Of these, about 50 per cent can be considered possible users of hearing aids. Mr Kneale says it is “deplorable” that this large, afflicted section of the community is so uninformed about advancements made in recent years in the field of hearing management. He says that the sense of hearing is a complex faculty, and where the normal function is disturbed hearing cannot be restored by merely making everything louder. Fifteen years ago, a lack

of understanding and technical “know-how” denied to many people the help that was available today, even for difficult cases. “Today, many New Zealanders using hearing aids are not obtaining the results they could and should be enjoying,” says Mr Kneale. Some of the fault lies with the hearing aid prescribed and some with the user (through lack of perseverance or ability to handle the aid); but the main cause is the lack of a system designed to give maximum correction, rather than partial assistance, says Mr Kneale. Many users of aids should be wearing something different, he says. Others could benefit by some modification to their existing apparatus. Many users were need-

lessly experiencing discomfort with their ear inserts, distress from noise, or distraction, from clothing rustle. Others were enduring blocked feelings in the ear or reverberation in the head. Mr Kneale says that no hearing-aid device will restore 100 per cent hearing where there has been some impairment, but it is possible today to enable a patient to enjoy comfortably the maximum possible use of the hearing they still possess. Medical and surgical techniques bring relief to many, and in the field of medicine

i there is no lack of expertise in New Zealand, says Mr Kneale, but it needs to be more widely known that there are advanced methods of hearing management, using the right hearing-aid system, that can make hearing a pleasure again. He suggests that all people involved in trying to restore hearing, the "hearing professionals,” should get together to share their knowledge and expertise to put New Zealand back in the forefront with the “best hearing-management service in the world.”