Between now and 2050 one in four people in the world will suffer from hearing loss, a worse figure compared to the current one in which one in five is affected. Furthermore, 80% of these individuals live in areas without adequate health systems. This is what emerged from the Sio National Congress – the Italian Society of Otorhinolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery – underway in Milan which, from this point of view, promoted an inter-society pact for the treatment of ear diseases and consequent hearing disorders, shared with the medical societies and health professions involved including paediatricians, geriatricians, general practitioners, audiometrists, hearing care professionals, speech and language therapists and health assistants.
“We are absolutely convinced – says Dominico Cuda, director of Otorhinolaryngology at the Piacenza hospital – that deafness is an outdated concept, that in fact we must speak of diseases of the hearing system”. Hence the dissemination of the ‘Living guidelines’ for the cochlear implant and the Italian guidelines for the same implant. Furthermore, the development of the register of implantable hearing aids within the Istituto Superiore di Sanità was analyzed and clinical comparisons were developed on the new indications regarding unilateral deafness.
Lastly, great attention was paid to telemedicine and to the new perspectives emerging in the context of the Pnrr: from 3D printers to artificial intelligence applications. “Digitalization in Italy – concludes Cuda – is growing more and more in every area of the social fabric. In particular, in the health sector, it is precisely telemedicine that creates opportunities that are good not only for the citizen, but also for the environment in which he lives”.
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