The Deaf - Harry Best

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Falls 24 4.7 25 5.0 Diseases of ear and throat 13 2.6 23 4.6 Catarrh and colds 13 2.6 — — Measles 18 3.5 18 3.6 Brain fever 17 3.3 16 3.2 Convulsions 14 2.8 13 2.6 Abscesses 10 2.0 12 2.4 La grippe 10 2.0 7 1.4 Accidents (not stated) 9 1.8 7 1.4 Whooping cough 7 1.4 7 1.4 Typhoid fever 7 1.4 6 1.2 Diphtheria 6 1.2 6 1.2 Mumps 5 1.0 5 1.0 Paralysis 5 1.0 4 0.8 Marasmus 2 0.4 4 0.8 Pneumonia 4 0.8 2 0.4 Dentition — — 2 0.4 Dropsy of blood 2 0.4 — — Chicken pox 1 0.2 1 0.2 Poisoning 1 0.2 1 0.2 Intermittent fever 1 0.2 1 0.2 Blood clotting on brain 1 0.2 — — Cholera infantum 1 0.2 — — Gastric fever — — 1 0.2 Sickness (not stated) 10 2.0 8 1.6 Unknown 37 7.3 38 7.6

      Possible Action for the Prevention of Adventitious Deafness

      In respect to present activities for the prevention of adventitious deafness, we find the situation very much like that of marking time. Deafness, since the beginning of time, has largely been accepted as the portion of a certain fraction of the race, and any serious and determined efforts for its eradication have been considered for the most part as of little hope.[22] With the auditory organs so securely hidden away in the head, entrenched within the protecting temporal bone, and with their structure so delicate and complicated, the problem may well have been regarded a baffling one even for the best labor of medicine and surgery. Hence it is that after deafness has once effected lodgment in the system, a cure has not usually been regarded as within reach, though for certain individual cases there may be medical examination and treatment, with attempts made at relief. For deafness in general, it has been felt that there has been little that could be done in the way of prevention or cure beyond the preservation of the general health and the warding off of diseases that might cause loss of hearing.

      As a matter of fact, however, altogether too little attention has been given hitherto to the possibilities of the prevention of deafness. Without question there is much at the outset that can be accomplished towards the prevention of those diseases that cause deafness. A large part, perhaps fully a third, as we have seen, are due to infectious diseases, and it is probably here that measures are likely to be most efficacious. A considerable portion likewise are the result of diseases affecting the passages of the nose and throat, and help should be possible for many of these if taken in hand soon enough. In certain diseases also, as scarlet fever, measles, typhoid fever, diphtheria, and others, there are not a few cases which, so far as deafness as a development is concerned, would prove amenable to skillful and persistent treatment. At the same time due attention to primary ear troubles would in a number of instances keep off permanent deafness. Indeed, it is possible that some thirty or forty per cent of adventitious deafness is preventable by present known means.[23]

      Aside from direct medical treatment for those diseases that cause deafness, there are other measures available in a program for the prevention of deafness. One of the foremost essentials is the report to the health authorities of all serious diseases that are liable to result in deafness. In this way proper medical care may be secured, and due precautions may be taken to isolate infectious cases. Even with meningitis, which is so hard usually to deal with and which is so severe in its ravages,

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