Untreated Hearing Loss Increases Risk of Dementia, Depression, and Falls
Brain scans show us untreated hearing loss, even mild cases, may contribute to a faster rate of atrophy, or loss of cells, in the brain. We’ve known for many years that untreated hearing loss leads to isolation, and that isolation has long been recognized as a risk factor for dementia, Alzheimer’s, and cognitive decline. When you struggle to hear someone clearly, you tend to avoid going out to eat or socializing in groups. Additionally, untreated hearing loss leads to a higher risk of falls. We use our ears to pick up subtle sounds in our environment, and if you don’t hear those sounds, your brain has to work harder. This subconscious multitasking may interfere with mental processing needed to walk safely.
What the Research Says
Untreated Hearing Loss May Contribute to Decrease of Brain Cells
Over the last decade, a series of studies from Johns Hopkins focused on the effects of untreated hearing loss on the brain. Frank Lin, MD, PhD and his team found people with untreated hearing losses had less gray brain matter than participants who had normal hearing. This is important because gray brain matter is responsible for muscle movement and sensory functions, including hearing, speech, and facets of higher learning such as attention, memory, emotions, decision making, and self-control.
In a separate study, they tracked 639 adults for nearly 12 years and found that having an untreated mild hearing loss doubled dementia risk, a moderate hearing loss tripled dementia risk, and a severe hearing loss was five times more likely to develop dementia.
Untreated Hearing Loss Recruits Other Areas of the Brain to Help with Hearing
Over the last few years, Anu Sharma, PhD with the University of Colorado suggested people with mild hearing losses showed their hearing centers of the brain lit up when performing listening exercises but also other areas of the brain lit up that are typically used for higher learning. This suggests more working memory (reasoning, decision making, and behavior) and executive function (attention, emotion, and self-control) are recruited to help because the hearing part of the brain alone is not getting enough information from the ears. Working memory and executive function are associated with increased listening effort.
Untreated Hearing Loss Increases Risk of Cognitive Decline
Brigham & Women’s Hospital explored the connection between hearing loss and cognitive decline in a 2019 study and found the risk of cognitive decline increases 30% with untreated mild hearing loss, 42% with moderate hearing loss, and 54% with severe hearing loss.
Livingston G, Huntley J, Sommerland A, et al. Dementia prevention, intervention, and care: 2020 report of The Lancet Commission. The Lancet 2020.
What You Can Do to Help Yourself
Use of Hearing Aids May Delay Cognitive Decline
After 18 months of hearing aid use, researchers at the University of Melbourne in 2020 found speech perception, self-reported listening disability, and quality of life had significantly improved for participants. Most notably, 97% of participants in this study showed either clinically significant improvement or stability in executive function - their mental ability to plan, organize information, and start tasks.
Hearing Loss Is #1 Modifiable Risk Factor in Dementia
The esteemed medical journal, The Lancet, in 2020 and 2017 found that hearing loss is the #1 modifiable risk factor in dementia. They suggest with dementia prevention, intervention, and care, “Be ambitious about prevention. We recommend active treatment of hypertension in middle aged (45–65 years) and older people (aged older than 65 years) without dementia to reduce dementia incidence. Interventions for other risk factors including more childhood education, exercise, maintaining social engagement, reducing smoking, and management of hearing loss, depression, diabetes, and obesity might have the potential to delay or prevent a third of dementia cases.”
The Effects of Music on Brain Health
Research suggests music lessons can increase brain function in older adults
Playing piano and other instruments improves attention, memory, and problem-solving skills
Musicians out-perform non-musicians in difficult speech-in-noise tasks
Training on the differences in timbre (sounds), tempo, rhythm, and pitch of music translates to better speech processing
*It’s important to remember that hearing loss does not cause dementia. Hearing loss is a risk factor and having hearing loss does not necessarily mean you will develop dementia.
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