Adults with hearing loss who used hearing aids had a lower risk of death than nonusers in a multinational analysis published 00087-5/fulltext) in The Lancet Healthy Longevity .<sup>1</sup> The findings add to evidence connecting hearing health with healthy aging, but leave an important question unanswered: Does treating hearing loss help people live longer, or do hearing aid users differ in other ways that influence...
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✦ The floor
Discussion
Signed responses from readers of the wire.
This large multinational finding strengthens the case for counselling patients with hearing loss about hearing aid uptake, but causality is not established — do not overstate survival benefit to patients until a randomised trial confirms it.
A major multinational study linking hearing aid use to reduced mortality raises the stakes of under-treatment in audiology and could reshape how hearing loss is framed in broader public-health and preventive-medicine conversations.
- 01Large multinational study published in The Lancet Healthy Longevity found hearing aid users with hearing loss had significantly lower mortality risk.
- 02The association held across multiple countries, suggesting the finding is not population-specific.
- 03Observational design means causality cannot be confirmed — healthy-user bias is a key confound.
- 04Findings add to a growing body of evidence linking untreated hearing loss to adverse systemic health outcomes.
- 05Results may be used to support public-health arguments for improved hearing aid access and reimbursement.
Adults with hearing loss who used hearing aids had a significantly lower risk of mortality compared to non-users.
studypartially supported- Journal
- The Lancet Healthy Longevity
- Publication type
- research_article
- Evidence level
- 2b
- Population
- Adults with hearing loss drawn from multiple countries
- Intervention
- Hearing aid use
- Comparator
- No hearing aid use among adults with hearing loss
Primary outcomes
All-cause mortality