Hearing Tests Recommended to All Seniors

The Association of Mature American Citizens (AMAC) warns that many American seniors are not getting their hearing checked regularly, and too many doctors are not encouraging them to do so, reports the Grayson Record . AMAC CEO Rebecca Weber said about half of all seniors older than 75 have hearing loss, and roughly one-third of those 65 to 70 cannot hear as well as they did when they were younger. A national poll of more than 2,000 adults aged 50 to 80 years found 80 percent said their primary care doctor had not inquired about their hearing in the past two years, and almost the same number had not had their hearing professionally checked over the same period. "Age-related hearing loss can have wide-ranging consequences, and can be addressed with assistive technologies, yet these data show a major gap in detection, and disparities between groups," said the University of Michigan's Michael McKee. Weber recommends that seniors get their hearing checked even if they are not experiencing obvious loss. "It's a good thing to find out as soon and as often as need be that your hearing is what it should be at your specific age," she said. The Healthy Hearing Website recommends that people 60 and older have a baseline hearing test and get rechecked every several years.