Hearing the Call: Ziauddin Hospital starts degree initiative for healthy hearing

The degree programme aims to train audiologists who are in much demand across the world.

KARACHI: At six months, Saad* was not communicating as much as other babies of his age - he was barely babbling - he did not seem to interact too much with those around him nor did he respond to his name or other sounds. His family visited several doctors but to no avail. Finally, he was diagnosed with a profound hearing loss by an audiologist.

Keeping in mind the need for professional audiologists, Ziauddin College of Speech Language and Hearing Sciences has launched its four year Bachelors of Science in Audiology degree programme.

It is a field that has great scope throughout the world, and was ranked as the sixth best career for 2012 in the USA.

The programme is a step Ziauddin University has taken in hopes of bridging the gap between the need and availability of qualified audiologists in Pakistan.

The incidence of hearing loss is around two or three live births in every 1,000. In addition, nearly 10 per cent of the world’s population is affected by hearing loss due to various reasons at some point in their lives. In order to manage such a large number of affected patients, there is a dire need of professionally trained audiologists.



Currently there are only 15 professionally qualified audiologists in Pakistan. As a result, the profession promises a great demand in the hearing healthcare industry.

Saad, and many children like him, have benefitted from the work of audiologists’ early intervention programmes, which include early detection and fitting of surgical or non-surgical hearing devices along with appropriate speech and language therapy sessions.

*The name of the patient has been changed to maintain confidentiality

Published in The Express Tribune, July 3^rd, 2013.