Audiology Australia is the peak professional community for audiologists in our country. The company recently hosted a webinar on Mental Health and Hearing Loss, with three of our clinical research team presenting their findings to roughly 150 audiologists.
Research lead for cognition and hearing loss at Ear Science Institute Australia, Dr Dona Jayakody, provided an overview of the clinical research our teams are currently undertaking.
Postdoctoral research fellow Dr Blake Lawrence shared his findings relating to hearing loss and depression published earlier this year.
“It’s important to disseminate our research findings beyond our academic publications and to audiences that may be directly impacted by our work (i.e., audiologists) but who often do not have time to keep up with all of the recently published research,” said Dr Lawrence.
“This experience allowed us to share the importance of our research with the broader community.”
Clinician, researcher and educator Dr Bec Bennett discussed her exploration of the current knowledge, beliefs, and practices of Australian audiologists when working with adults with hearing loss and mental health issues.
“We measured the attendees’ opinions on a variety of questions before and after the webinar, and were astounded at the results,” said Dr Bennett.
“We saw a shift in people’s beliefs and opinions regarding the role of the audiologist over the course of the webinar; it’s nice to see that we made people really think.”
Take a look at some of the results from before and after the webinar below!
The team asked the attendees to indicate whether they believed audiologists should be:
Detecting mental health signs/symptoms: 55% increased to 77%
Screening for mental health when they detect signs/symptoms: 38% increased to 76%
Providing emotional and mental health support: 38% increased to 73%
