Prevalence of Hearing Loss and Hearing Care Use Among Asian Americans: A Nationally Representative Sample

Objective: To assess the prevalence of hearing loss and factors affecting hearing care use among Asian Americans, using the first nationally representative sample of Asian Americans. Study Design: National cross-sectional survey. Setting: Ambulatory examination centers. Patients: Three thousand six hundred twelve adults (522 Asian American) aged 20 to 69 in the 2011 to 2012 National Health and Examination Survey with pure-tone audiometry. Main Outcome Measure(s): Percentage with hearing loss, undertaking a hearing test before the study, and hearing aid use. Hearing loss was defined as better hearing ear speech frequency pure-tone average ≥25 dBHL. Analyses incorporated sampling weights to account for complex sampling design. Results: The prevalence of hearing loss was 6.0% [95% CI 3.1–8.9%] among Asian Americans, comparable to White, Black, and Hispanic groups, and increased substantially with age (OR: 2.25 [95% CI: 1.6–3.2]). After adjusting for age and pure-tone average, Asian Americans with hearing loss were less likely to have received a hearing test compared with White (OR: 0.27 [95% CI: 0.20–0.36, p = 

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