My husband, a physician, always tells his patients that the most important organ to use in a consultation with him is their ears.
I cannot agree more!
Our hearing allows us to receive information about our illness, our treatment options, and what the next steps should be.
Despite his and my conviction, many clients come to a hearing appointment admitting that they have been struggling to hear for years but they had too much going on with their health to attend to their hearing.
Attending important medical appointments with untreated hearing loss is very risky to both the patient and the treating healthcare professional.
Medical appointments usually are fast-paced experiences where a lot of information is conveyed in quick order.
Doctors are required to treat and type in cluttered offices, with little or no training on how to speak with people with untreated hearing loss.
What the books tell us about health information is that: • Only about 50 per cent of information given by health care professionals is remembered. Between 40-80 per cent may be forgotten immediately. Most of us just remember a small proportion of facts. • Even more interesting is that of the small number of facts we do remember, almost half of the information is remembered incorrectly.
If half of what is said is forgotten, and the other half is distorted in accuracy, the result can only be a very misunderstood message. Now we add an untreated hearing loss to the mix – where we only hear certain sounds, where we rely on lipreading, and we’re perhaps a little nervous about the result – we have ourselves and our treating medical team working very hard to ensure that we have understood.
It is important to remember that when anyone in the room has an untreated hearing loss, everyone in the room has a hearing problem.
The literature tells is that it takes between seven to 10 years for someone to seek help with their hearing from the time that they know they have a hearing problem.
That is a lot of medical appointments to attend not empowered by good hearing.
The following strategies are useful during medical appointments. • Acknowledge that you have a hearing problem to your healthcare professional. • Inform them that you benefit from them facing you when they are speaking as you rely on lipreading. • You may have to say this a few times because doctors are required to make notes during the consultation which means they may be talking to you while typing, and not facing you. • Ask for repetition if you are unsure. • Request a written copy of critical information, if possible. • Bring along a trusted person who is familiar with your hearing difficulties to take notes and to clarify information.
Most importantly though, book an appointment with your local, independent audiologist to start your journey towards better hearing and understanding – it is the responsible choice; and your doctor will thank you.
