学童難聴について—長崎市内難聴学童の調査成績より

ON DEAFNESS AMONG SCHOOL CHILDREN

　Ⅰ．緒言

　近年，学童の難聴に対する関心が高まり，難聴学級の設立が各方面で叫ばれるに到つた。著者らは今度，長崎市内小，中学校の比較的多数の生徒を対象に聴力検査を行なうことができたので，その成績について報告する。

The authors attempted a survey of loss of hearing among 73,446 school children of the City of Nagasaki, who belonged to the age group of grades 1 to 9, the primary Grades and Junior High School. In the Primary Gra-des group 464 children (1.42%) were found to be affected with loss of hearing and, among the Junior High School group 223, (2.18%). Tubotympanitis was the cause of the loss of hearing in majority of cases but, in conside-rable number of others it was due to chronic otitis media. It was surprising to find so many cases of chronic otitis media in spite of the present day availability of antibiotic drugs. Of the 207 deaf children, there were 88 who were not aware of their own deafness. It was revealed in this study that when the amount of deafness is smaller than 20-30db the individual very often may fail to recog-nize his own deafness.