Sadan Ela, Bakal Anastasia, Freud Tamar, Samson Tali, Press Yan
Joyce & Irving Goldman Medical School, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
Clalit Health Services Southern District, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
BMC Prim Care. 2025 May 14;26(1):162. doi: 10.1186/s12875-025-02861-7.
Hearing impairment is a prevalent barrier to communication that significantly affects older adults. This study explores family physicians' knowledge and attitudes towards communicating with hearing-impaired older patients.
A cross-sectional study was conducted among family physicians at Clalit Healthcare Services clinics in southern Israel. The study included a video illustrating 12 common errors made when communicating with hearing-impaired older patients.
Among the 101 participating family physicians, only 15.8% reported adequate training in medical school on treating these patients, and 17.8% during residency. On average, physicians identified 2.25 ± 1.35 errors of the 12 possible ones shown in the video. Ten physicians (9.9%) failed to identify any errors. Twenty-three (22.8%) identified one error, 25 (24.8%) found two, and 24 (23.8%) identified three, thirteen (11.9%) four, and 6 (5.9%) found five mistakes. No participant identified six or more mistakes. The only statistically significant variable for identifying more than three communication errors was the physician's perceived low or very low comfort level with communication skills during visits with hearing-impaired older adults (OR = 0.337, 95% CI: 0.126-0.900, p = 0.030).
The findings highlight the importance of ongoing medical education programs to improve communication strategies for healthcare providers treating hearing-impaired older adults.
听力障碍是一种普遍存在的沟通障碍，对老年人有显著影响。本研究探讨家庭医生在与听力受损老年患者沟通方面的知识和态度。
在以色列南部克拉利特医疗服务诊所的家庭医生中进行了一项横断面研究。该研究包括一段视频，展示了与听力受损老年患者沟通时常见的12个错误。
在101名参与研究的家庭医生中，只有15.8%的人报告在医学院接受过关于治疗这些患者的充分培训，17.8%的人在住院医师培训期间接受过相关培训。平均而言，医生们从视频中展示的12个可能错误中识别出2.25±1.35个错误。10名医生（9.9%）未能识别出任何错误。23名（22.8%）医生识别出1个错误，25名（24.8%）医生识别出2个错误，24名（23.8%）医生识别出3个错误，13名（11.9%）医生识别出4个错误，6名（5.9%）医生识别出5个错误。没有参与者识别出6个或更多错误。识别出3个以上沟通错误的唯一具有统计学意义的变量是医生在与听力受损老年人就诊时对沟通技能的自我感觉较低或非常低（OR = 0.337，95% CI：0.126 - 0.900，p = 0.030）。
研究结果凸显了持续医学教育项目对于改善治疗听力受损老年人的医疗服务提供者沟通策略的重要性。
