HYDERABAD: India has approximately 75,000 (6 per cent) of the total population with hearing problems. About 40,000 of these individuals are impaired from birth or acquire hearing loss during early childhood. If left untreated in their formative years of life, these children end up remaining hearing and speech challenged throughout their lives. In order to create awareness among hearing loss among the general population and treat hearing impairment at an early age, Society to Aid the Hearing Impairment (SAHI) in association with Apollo Hospitals and Apollo Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, is undertaking an ambitious project of ‘Deaf-Free Telangana’.
“Today about three or four in a thousand people have total hearing loss. If children are born deaf, they need to be treated in the first two to three years of their life. Otherwise, it will result in permanent deafness, because of which they will also be unable to speak,” says Dr EC Vinay Kumar, head of ENT department, Apollo Health City.
Speaking about the ‘Deaf-Free Telangana’ campaign, he said, “Our mission is to educate people about the importance of early intervention regarding hearing loss. Whether it is providing hearing aids or surgery, treatment of hearing loss patients must be done at an early age so that they can join the mainstream of life. Our NGO SAHI has completed 10 years so we decided to widen our campaign and have selected the Chevella parliamentary constituency and we plan to make it deaf-free in the next one or two years.”
Pointing out that there is a severe lack of awareness among the general public regarding hearing loss, Dr Kumar explained that most of these are preventable. “In India consanguineous marriages are a common practice. About 60 per cent of children who come out of such marriages, suffer from hearing loss. So this is something that can be prevented. In addition to this, providing better care and facilities to pregnant women can also help prevent hearing loss,” Dr Kumar observes.
Apart from consanguineous marriages, genetic disorders due to chromosomal abnormality, meningitis or brain fever; low birth weight, jaundice and fits at birth can lead to hearing loss, point out experts.
The first camp as part of the ‘Deaf-Free Telangana’ campaign will take place in Chevella town on Sunday. As part of the project, intensive public awareness programs, regular camps for children below the age of 15 years, massive screening, distribution of hearing aids and corrective surgical procedures for the hearing impaired will be undertaken extensively.
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