Experts call for better care of hearing impairment

BEIJING -- Chinese experts have called for improved awareness of hearing impairment and increasing the use of hearing aids as the country has about 100 million people with hearing disabilities.

Long Mo, deputy director of the China Rehabilitation Research Center for Hearing and Speech Impairment, said only 7.9 percent of Chinese who suffer from medium-level or worse hearing impairments use hearing aids or artificial cochleas.

Gao Zhiqiang, director of the Department of Otolaryngology with the Peking Union Medical College Hospital, said people also tend to make mistakes in wearing hearing aids, causing further deterioration of their hearing abilities.

"Patients with hearing loss in both ears are recommended to wear hearing aids on both sides," Gao said. "But only 15 percent of those wearing hearing aids go through fitting for both of their ears."

Wang Shuo, a researcher at the Beijing Institute of Otolaryngology, said hearing aids with Chinese language processors can help improve the equipment's recognition of speech and therefore better suit users whose mother tongue is Chinese.