Three adult groups in BC have hearing health costs covered by the provincial health care system — people with disabilities, veterans (who are primarily covered federally) and workers who develop hearing loss due to work-related noise exposure, thanks to WorkSafe BC. The rest of the population? No coverage.
BC lags behind other provinces and territories when it comes to consistent coverage, which Dr. Brian Westerberg — head of the division of otolaryngology (head and neck surgery) in UBC’s department of surgery — attributed to a potential lack of awareness about the impacts of hearing loss.
“As a surgeon, I’ll see somebody with a condition that can be managed either with surgery … or with hearing aids. The surgery comes with the risk of damaging the hearing or losing all of the hearing and balance function in that ear, but it’s totally covered by the health care system. Hearing aids, which are a risk-free option … [have] no funding available.”
After seeing patients choose surgery because they couldn’t afford hearing aids, Westerberg joined the Help BC Hear Better Group — a team of ear surgeons, audiologists, hearing aid dispensers and people with hearing loss who advocate for better funding for hearing services in BC.
Assembled in 2022, the group began assessing how BC compares to other provinces in terms of hearing health coverage, publishing a briefing note in 2023 to advocate for the creation of a Hearing Health Program. Now, they’re applying for grants to research more evidence to support funding for hearing care.
At the 2024 Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) Annual Convention, the District of Saanich endorsed a resolution proposed by Help BC Hear Better, which urged the UBCM to lobby the provincial government for improved access to hearing health care, including funding support for hearing aids for children and the elderly.
“By putting forth this motion for discussion, we hope to inspire other municipalities to support this important initiative,” said Karen Harper, District of Saanich councilor, who has hearing loss in a statement to Saanich News.
The group plans to continue collecting evidence on the benefits of hearing care funding, and is “trying to find inroads into government” and “talking to different members of provincial parliament … trying to get [our message] further and further up the chain,” according to Westerberg.
Another barrier to seeking hearing health care is the stigma associated with it.
Due to the association of hearing loss with aging and disability, the majority of people who may benefit from using hearing aids don’t use them and people wait an average of 10 years before seeking help after noticing hearing loss.
“It’s funny that people will walk around the street wearing those big, ugly Bluetooth things stuck in their ears, and they think they’re cool, and yet we give people a pair of sleek hearing aids that you can hardly see, and there’s a stigma associated with them,” said Westerberg.
Many organizations in Canada like the Canadian Association for the Deaf are trying to help with the stigma but institutional barriers remain.
“It’s a vicious circle … from zero to four years of age … the amount of information that you store in your brain during those four years, because you heard things is astronomical, and if you miss out on that, you’re behind the eight ball from the get go,” said Westerberg.
In 2007, the BC Early Hearing program was established, which screens every infant born in BC for hearing loss. It lowered the age of detecting congenital hearing loss from two to three years to under six months.
The program enables children to receive hearing aids, and if they don’t work, cochlear implants. Having a cochlear implant by a year of age allows 81 per cent of children with hearing loss to attend mainstream schools.
Zooming out to preventing hearing loss, Westerberg emphasized the importance of taking care early on, such as wearing hearing protection to loud concerts.
“We used to say [hearing impairment after exposure to loud noises] was a temporary problem and caused no permanent damage. But the research shows that it does cause permanent damage … It’s a cumulative effect, and eventually it’ll lead to permanent hearing loss,” he said.
“Pretty much all of us will experience hearing loss if we live long enough, just because our society is so loud.”
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