Instead of being irritable as he had been in the past, the patient was pleasant and cooperative despite his obvious pain. He could finally hear. These were among the experiences that physicians, patients and others recently shared with a panel considering whether professional standards are needed to ensure quality of care for patients with hearing impairments. The panel met during one phase of a project being conducted for the Health Care Financing Administration to develop standards that would apply across all health care settings. Recommendations will be presented to HCFA in August.
Doctors can expect to see more patients in their practices who are deaf or hard of hearing.
One in 10 Americans has some hearing loss, according to Philip Zazove, MD, clinical associate professor of family medicine at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, a member of the panel developing quality standards. As the population ages, the number of people with hearing impairments is expected to climb. The foundation is conducting the project for HCFA in collaboration with Gallaudet University, Washington, D.C., which focuses on students who are deaf or hard of hearing. Yet few doctors are fluent in it. But they could barely finger-spell, knew only a few signs, or applied English grammatical rules and had no appreciation for ASL grammar.