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DENNISON HEARING – HEARING LOSS LINKED TO DEMENTIA
BY BETH SLAUGHTER SEXTON STAFF CORRESPONDENT
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It was a headline grabber for sure. When a study that linked untreated hearing loss and dementia was first released, this major revelation was featured on The Today Show, The Charlie Rose Show and other TV programs. The study began connecting the dots.
That report came out about seven years ago after Johns Hopkins University began an in-depth look at how we age. It was said they “studied everything from toenail fungus on up.” But the biggest news they found by far was that untreated hearing loss increases the risk for developing dementia 200-500 percent.
“So with normal hearing you have no increased risk of dementia,” explains
William Dennison, a hearing healthcare professional board-certified in Hearing Instrument Sciences. “With a mild hearing loss, you have a 200 percent increased risk of developing dementia. With a moderate hearing loss, you have a 300 percent increased risk of developing dementia. And with a severe hearing loss, you have a 500 percent increased risk of developing dementia. You may be asking, 'Can I treat my hearing loss and decrease my risk of developing dementia?' And the answer would be, 'Yes, you can.'”
Dennison is the founder of Dennison Hearing Solutions and has worked in the hearing healthcare field for almost a decade. He holds a Bachelor's of Science degree and a Master's of Arts degree from Georgia College and
State University. Dennison is the only tinnitus care provider certified by the International Hearing Society in the state of Georgia. He has helped thousands of patients by providing hearing evaluations and screenings, customized hearing aid fittings and tinnitus management.
He is also the son of Dr. Laura Dennison, who has more than 35 years in the hearing healthcare field and helped more than 10,000 patients on their path to better hearing. She is nationally board-certified in the Hearing Instrument Sciences and holds a doctorate in audiology from AT Still University, as well as a Bachelor's of Science degree and Master's of Arts degree from East Tennessee State University. She has held numerous leadership posts on both the executive council and the exam committee of the National Board for Certification in Hearing Instrument Sciences. Dr. Dennison is the chief audiology adviser for Dennison Hearing Solutions, which is located at 3511 Braselton Highway in Dacula.
Together, the Dennisons have authored a booklet titled Hearing, Dementia and the Brain to provide the latest information regarding the link between hearing loss and dementia and what a person can do to help prevent it. In four sections, the booklet examines the following topics: How We Hear; The Negative Impact of Untreated Hearing Loss; Hearing Loss and Dementia and The Positive Impact of Treating Hearing Loss.
“So when your ears are young and healthy there are 60,000 nerve fibers that leave the ear and by the time they get to the brain, it is estimated that there are tens of millions of neurons devoted to hearing,” William Dennison said. “But what happens as we age is that not only do we lose hair cells and a bunch of those neurons, but the quality of the nerve fibers we have left diminishes. So just making the sound louder doesn't help. We need help with the processing. When you take a standard hearing test, it takes no effort to hear a beep-beep-beep sound—unless you have tinnitus and that's a whole different topic. That standard hearing test doesn't really tell us anything about how the brain is processing sound. The brain does four different things for us when we are hearing. One, orientation. Two, recognition. Three, focus. Four, filter.”
That Johns Hopkins study connected untreated hearing loss to dementia. What is dementia? Dennison explains it is decline in mental ability severe enough to interfere with daily life. For a dementia diagnosis, medical professionals say at least two of the following core mental functions must be significantly impaired: Memory; communication and language; ability to focus and pay attention; reasoning and judgment and visual perception.
“Have you ever forgotten where you put your keys?” Dennison asked. “Have you ever gone shopping and forgotten where you parked the car?
Have you ever gone to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator and forgotten what you came in there to do? Good news—these are not signs of dementia. But have you ever picked up keys and not known what to do with them? Or have you gotten in your car and not known how to get home? Or choked on a midnight snack because you forgot how to swallow? Those are signs of dementia. That's how disabling and mind-robbing this disease is.
“Hearing is involved in the top three mental functions. That's how important hearing is to your day-to-day cognitive function. If you have any sense of any hearing loss, you need to use it or lose it. You need to catch it early and treat it early.”
Dennison offers what he calls four take away messages from his published booklet.
“If you treat your hearing loss like any other chronic medical condition, you will have increased quality of life; improved cognitive functions; reduce the risk of dementia and provide proper stimulation to the brain,” he said.
He also encourages patients to treat their hearing loss as they would any other major disease, such as diabetes. A doctor tells a patient he has diabetes and to take this pill and the patient takes it, or a doctor tells a patient she has cancer and must have a certain surgery or take a course of chemotherapy, and that patient does it.
“So, if you have hearing loss, you should listen to your hearing health professional and treat your hearing loss early,” he said. “...So why would you treat your hearing loss? Why would you make the financial commitment, the investment of time to treat your hearing loss? Because let me tell you, treating hearing loss is not like eyes. You don't pop on a pair of glasses and come back once a year for a test and just fix the prescription. That is not how treating hearing loss works. It's an adaptive process. Your brain has to retrain itself to hear sounds.”
Dennison cites numerous studies and quotes several researchers throughout his booklet, including Dr. Murali Doriaswamay of Duke University, who commented regarding the billions of dollars spent by private industry and government on developing medicines to slow or prevent dementia.
“The benefits of correcting hearing loss on cognition are twice as large as the benefits from any cognitive-enhancing drugs now on the market,” the Duke doctor said. “It should be the first thing we focus on.”
“So what can you do about it today?” Dennison asks. “Have your hearing evaluated by Dennison Hearing Solutions. Call us at 770-209-2627 to set up an appointment. Develop a treatment plan with your hearing healthcare professional. The best thing you can do is have that hearing test and everything is normal. And that's good-- we've got a baseline to compare it against future tests.”
One of Dennison's favorite sayings is, “Aging is inevitable and irreversible, but decline is optional.”
