by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition
This piece from NPR discusses how doctors and researchers with disabilities are changing medicine. When a problem is a secret, it is a source of shame and can’t be dealt with. If it is disclosed and discussed, however, it may still be a problem, but it can be dealt with and it is less of a source of shame.
When I spoke at the 2017 meeting of the Institute for Noise Control Engineering in Grand Rapids, Michigan, across the river from the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Library, I noted that his wife Betty Ford was a pioneer in discussing two formerly kept secrets–that she had breast cancer and had developed an addiction to prescription drugs. She fortunately survived her breast cancer to live many years more, and successfully dealt with her addiction. I then noted that I would publicly disclose that I had two auditory disabilities, tinnitus and hyperacusis, both fortunately mild and not life-limiting, but disabilities nonetheless.
I have mild hearing loss, too, again fortunately not life-limiting except in terms of understanding speech in a noisy environment. Prof. Margaret Wallhagen in San Francisco has written about the stigma of hearing loss. Hearing loss should be destigmatized.
More importantly, noise-induced hearing loss should be prevented.
So avoid noise or use hearing protection if you can’t avoid it, because noise-induced hearing loss is 100% preventable.
