EVOTION – Big Data Supporting Public Hearing Health Policies

Abstract

Hearing Loss (HL) is a highly prevalent chronic disease (the 5th cause of disability world-wide), which increases the risk of cognitive decline, mental illness, and depression, and furthermore leads to social isolation, unemployment/early retirement, loss of income and work discrimination. To enable successful holistic management of HL, appropriate public health policies for HL prevention, early diagnosis, long-term treatment and rehabilitation are required. In addition, HL management would benefit from detection and prevention of cognitive decline; protection from noise; and initiatives for socioeconomic inclusion of HL patients. However, the evidence for forming such policies and enabling true holistic HL management is lacking. Specifically, holistic HL management policies require access to and analysis of heterogeneous data sources. In EVOTION, such big data from five different clinical organizations are available and continuous acquisition of real-time data produced by sensors and hearing aids used by HL patients will support their continuous update. In order to utilize these data in forming holistic HL management policies, EVOTION is developing an integrated IT platform supporting: 1) the acquisition and analysis of heterogeneous big data related to HL; 2) policy decision making, i.e. selection of effective interventions related to the holistic management of HL based on the outcomes of 1) and the formulation of related public health policies; and 3) specification and continuous monitoring of the effects of such policies in a sustainable manner.