Dr. Yaw Nyadu Offei, an audiologist at the Centre for Hearing and Speech Services (CHSS) and the Acting Head of the Department of Special Education of the University of Education, Winneba, has advised Ghanaians to abstain from self-medication and use of unapproved drugs that could affect their sense of hearing. He reiterated the importance and functions of the ear and stressed the need to ensure the effective management of disease conditions affecting the ear. Dr. Nyadu Offei made these comments during a sensitisation and free ear screening for inhabitants of Breman Nwomaso in the Asikuma-Odoben-Brakwa District of the Central Region.

Dr. Yaw Nyadu Offei seriously advised against the use of sticks and cotton buds to soothe irritating ears. He asked that ear problems should rather be reported to the Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) nurses or medical facilities for professional advice and attention.

Dr. Yaw Nyadu Offei cautioned parents against poor parental care for their children. “One way of identifying children with hearing loss is that they may not hear sounds or even respond to their own name”, he said. Such children begin to babble then stop for no apparent reason. Sometimes they fail to mention single word.

To confirm such hearing challenges, there is the need to use the Little Ears score approach. With this method, parents are made to respond to 35 item auditory questionnaires based on the auditory behaviour of infants and children of 0 – 3years. This is used as a screening tool to supplement other objective auditory measurement to give proper status of a child or infant.

The people were taken through Hear Check Screening, Orthoscopic examination and treatment. In all, one hundred and eighty-one (181) people made up of mostly the aged and children less than twenty (20) years were screened.

In another development, one hundred and thirty (130) people benefited from the free screening exercise conducted at Ayeldo, a farming community with a population of three thousand (3,000) in the Abura-Asebu-Kwamankese District of the Central Region on August 28, 2015.

In an exclusive interview after the exercises, Dr. Nyadu Offei appealed for more sponsorship to enable the team of audiologists continue with the hearing screening in more remote communities across the country.

He said, the team among other things offer Counselling Services, Hearing Aid Fitting and Repairs, Ear washing, Pure Tone Audiometric Test free of charge. Dr. Yaw Nyadu Offei urged opinion leaders, policy makers, and philanthropists, governmental and non-governmental organisations to support the Centre. The Centre can be contacted for further enquiries on 0206864023 or through E-mail(chss@uew.edu.gh for).

Paa Paintsil-Winneba