ABSTRACT
Hearing therapy is part of hearing rehabilitation aimed at helping people and their families come to terms with their hearing loss and effectively manage their listening difficulties. Understanding the grieving process and the individual’s emotional response, which can depend on changing circumstances throughout life, helps clinicians provide an appropriate response to an individual with hearing loss. Hearing therapy can help a person understand how their hearing difficulties are affected by internal and external factors and help develop positive coping strategies. Basic audiological counselling, communication training and problem solving should be performed routinely as part of the adult rehabilitation pathway, but more complex cases should be referred to a specialist audiologist or therapist. Therapists also have a key role in signposting or referring to other services. The session number and duration can vary, with a single hour session and follow-up a few months later being appropriate for many patients through to intensive auditory rehabilitation programmes for new cochlear implant users.
