China faces huge lack of hearing aid specialists: ministry

China faces huge lack of hearing aid specialists: ministry

China is faced with a huge lack of hearing aid specialists who can examine and evaluate people's hearing problems and recommend suitable aid devices for them, the Ministry of Health said Monday.

A total of more than 60,000 hearing aid specialists are needed to serve China's 27 million plus people with moderate or severe hearing problems, but the country's number of available professionals is less than 20 percent of the total figure needed, according to the ministry.

China currently has only around 10,000 such technical professionals, the ministry said in a statement, adding that there needs to be one hearing aid specialist for every 400 hearing-impaired people, the ministry said in a statement.

China still has a long way to go in the training and selecting of enough qualified hearing aid specialists, said the ministry.

The ministry recently organized a national professional competition in hearing recovery in a bid to create a favorable atmosphere for training of hearing aid specialists.

Editor: Mu Xuequan

English.news.cn   2011-11-07 23:11:31 FeedbackPrintRSS
BEIJING, Nov. 7 (Xinhua)