Hearing loss has been linked with a variety of medical, social and cognitive ills, including dementia. However, a new study led by a Johns Hopkins researcher suggests that hearing loss may also be a risk factor for another huge public health problem: falls.

To determine whether hearing loss and falling are connected, Frank Lin, M.D., Ph.D., at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and the university’s Bloomberg School of Public Health, and his colleague Luigi Ferrucci, M.D., Ph.D., of the National Institute on Aging, used data from the 2001 to 2004 cycles of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. This research program has periodically gathered health data from thousands of Americans since 1971.

Dr. Lin and Dr. Ferrucci found that people with a 25-decibel hearing loss, classified as mild, were nearly three times more likely to have a history of falling. Every additional 10-decibels of hearing loss increased the chances of falling by 1.4 fold. This finding still held true, even when researchers accounted for other factors linked with falling, including age, sex, race, cardiovascular disease and vestibular function. Even excluding participants with moderate to severe hearing loss from the analysis didn’t change the results.

Dr. Lin adds that among the possible explanations for this link is that people who can’t hear well might not have good awareness of their overall environment, making tripping and falling more likely. In addition, if hearing loss imposes a cognitive load, such as straining to hear conversation, then the brain could become overwhelmed with demands on its limed resources.

Funding support for this study was provided by the National Institutes of Health.

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