Justification for Integrated Care of Dementia and Presbycusis: Focused on National Dementia Policy

Correspondence: Woojae Han, PhD Division of Speech Pathology and Audiology, 8603 Natural Science Building, Hallym University, 1 Hallymdaehak-gil, Chuncheon 24252, Korea Tel: +82-33-248-2216 Fax: +82-33-256-3420 E-mail: woojaehan@hallym.ac.kr Dementia management has become one of essential factors in the national policy globally in terms of the elderly health care service. In the brief communication, we compared various national reports from other countries to see whether current care service for the dementia had integrative approach for the patients with hearing loss in Korea. We also discussed a need of systematic hearing care for the elderly with dementia who was also a suspected case of aged-related hearing loss because many studies had confirmed that untreated hearing loss has a negative effect on dementia and vice versa. After analyzing the national policy from several countries, we found that the systems had been well established to screen dementia patients by using various clinical tests in UK, Canada, and Japan who provided appropriate services by classifying types of the dementia. Remarkably, the hearing test was included as the testing protocol for the dementia in Canada and the experts such as speech pathologists and music therapists had worked in a non-pharmacotherapy program for the elderly with dementia in France. Unfortunately, the dementia policy of Korea needs to be refined when considering the hearing care/management in that the integrated management of hearing and dementia are important. In addition, the clinicians who work for the dementia care home need to know audiological knowledge. Since the auditory training and rehabilitation for the elderly can reduce increased rate of cognitive decline, we strongly recommend that auditory training should be a part of the cognitive rehabilitation programs in the dementia care home.