Journal
JOURNALS OF GERONTOLOGY SERIES A-BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES AND MEDICAL SCIENCES
Volume 73, Issue 10, Pages 1383-1389Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS INC
DOI: 10.1093/gerona/glx250
Keywords
Auditory loss; Health; Rehabilitation
Categories
Funding
- ARMA (Bordeaux)
- Caisse Nationale d'Assurance Maladie des Travailleurs Salaries (CNAMTS)
- Conseil General de la Dordogne
- Conseil General de la Gironde
- Conseil Regional d'Aquitaine
- Fondation de France
- France Alzheimer (Paris)
- GIS Longevite
- Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale (INSERM)
- Mutuelle Generale de l'Education Nationale (MGEN)
- Mutualite Sociale Agricole (MSA)
- NOVARTIS Pharma (France)
- SCORInsurance (France)
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Background: Hearing loss in older adults is suspected to play a role in social isolation, depression, disability, lower quality of life, and risk of dementia. Such suspected associations still need to be consolidated with additional research. With a particularly long follow-up, this study assessed the relationship between hearing status and four major adverse health events: death, dementia, depression, and disability. Methods: Prospective community-based study of 3,777 participants aged 265 followed up for 25 years. At baseline, 1,289 reported hearing problems and 2,290 reported no trouble. The risk of occurrence of the negative outcomes, including death, dementia, depressive symptoms, disability in activities of daily living (ADL), and instrumental ADL (IADL), was assessed with Cox proportional hazards models. Results: Adjusting for numerous confounders, an increased risk of disability and dementia was found for participants reporting hearing problems. An increased risk of depression was found in men reporting hearing problems. In additional exploratory analyses, such associations were not found in those participants using hearing aids. Mortality was not associated with self-reported hearing loss. Conclusions: Our study confirms the strong link between hearing status and the risk of disability, dementia, and depression. These results highlight the importance of assessing the consequences of treating hearing loss in elders in further studies.
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