The slogan for this year\u2019s large-scale campaign is \u201cTo hear for life, listen with care!\u201d It has been estimated that more than 1 billion people suffer from various hearing impairments affecting their everyday communication. The overwhelming majority of them live in low- and middle-income countries with no access to essential medical services. WHO data also shows that worldwide on average 83% of people who should be using hearing aids do not use them. Unless effective prevention and treatment measures are taken, by 2050, the number of people with severe hearing loss alone will exceed 900 million.<\/p>\n
During World Hearing Day 2022, WHO will focus on safe listening to maintain good hearing throughout life. Indeed, many common causes of hearing loss can be prevented, including hearing loss caused by exposure to loud sounds, and safe listening can reduce the risk of noise-related hearing loss.<\/p>\n
In 2021 WHO published the World Hearing Report, which highlighted the growing number of people living with and at risk of hearing loss. Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski, Director of the Institute of Hearing Physiology and Pathology, notes that these numbers could be much higher due to the increasing severity of hearing damage in Covid-19 patients.<\/p>\n
\u2013 The situation has been changing very dynamically in the last 2 years. \u2013 emphasizes Prof. H. Skar\u017cy\u0144ski. \u2013 At the beginning of the pandemic, the hearing disorders were similar to those in other patients with upper respiratory tract infections. Changes on the surface of mucous membranes in the nose, nasopharynx, auditory tubes, and middle ear effusion caused progressive hearing loss, resulting from swelling and fluid accumulation in the middle ears. With the nasal sinus infections regression, ear lesions usually disappeared, and hearing loss was restored. It was most noticeable in the children who had already gotten over the disease and were subject to subsequent throat or nose infections. Last year, we observed another disturbing phenomenon following Covid-19 infection in children and adults. This involved unilateral or bilateral hearing impairment following permanent damage to inner ear function. There was even complete unilateral or bilateral deafness in many such cases, requiring surgical intervention. \u2013 adds Professor Skar\u017cy\u0144ski.<\/p>\n
However, the positive fact is that Polish patients are the first, or one of the first in the world, to have access to all the latest technologies and pioneer clinical procedures. Specialists from the World Center can help almost everyone, putting an end to their world of silence, loneliness and isolation. For almost 20 years, the World Hearing Center has performed the most significant number of hearing surgeries in the world. Last year it also performed the most significant number of hearing implant surgeries globally for patients with different types of deafness.<\/p>\n
\u2013 It is essential to me to enable deaf and profoundly hard of hearing people to be still socially active. And those who were born deaf could develop their hearing, speech, learning new languages and other skills, e.g. artistic ones. \u2013 says Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski. \u2013 That is why I was pleased to hear that on March 3, exactly on World Hearing Day, a great premiere will take place. We invite all Polish viewers to the cinemas to see the \u201cSonata\u201d movie, made under our honorary patronage. It is a true story of my patient and an exceptional musician Grzegorz P\u0142onka from Murzasichle. The film shows an incredible, based on facts, and very moving way of a young man to achieve something seemingly impossible.<\/p>\n
This is a true story. Grzegorz P\u0142onka (Micha\u0142 Sikorski), after years of living in complete silence, thanks to his parents\u2019 determination (Ma\u0142gorzata Foremniak, \u0141ukasz Simlat), the support of a group of good people and an implant procedure at the Hearing Physiology and Pathology Institute of Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski (Jerzy Stuhr), regained his hearing and could fulfil his biggest dream \u2013 play Beethoven\u2019s \u201cMoonlight Sonata\u201d. A directorial debut of Bartosz Blaschke, won the Audience Award and an individual award for Micha\u0142 Sikorski for the Professional Acting Debut at the 46th Polish Film Festival in Gdynia.<\/p>\n
Grzegorz Plonka has been a patient of the World Hearing Center of the Institute of Hearing Physiology and Pathology since 2007. For many years the boy was incorrectly diagnosed. Only at the age of 13 he was diagnosed with severe sensorineural hearing loss. Before that, he was suspected of autism and profound mental retardation. \u201cWhen I got the implant, it was something I didn\u2019t expect \u2013 I heard birds singing. And I wanted to listen to them all the time.\u201d \u2013 Gregory recalls. \u2013 \u201cEverything changed with the implant. Everything was new. I started listening playing with sounds, and I just fell in love with music. Thanks to the implant, today I can hear the whole orchestra, flutes, high notes.\u201d He learned to play Ludwig van Beethoven\u2019s \u201cMoonlight Sonata through hard work.\u201d And he became the winner of the 1st International Music Festival for Children, Youth and Adults with Hearing Disorders, \u201cBeats of Cochlea\u201d in 2015. Grzegorz graduated from primary music school, underwent IT courses, released his own album, and ran his YouTube channel. He is interested in photography, taking pictures of plants and mountains. He learned how to tune a piano on his own. However, for Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski and his team, Grzegorz will remain first and foremost an ambassador of achievements in the treatment of hearing disorders owing to progress in sciences and medicine.<\/p>\n
In 2017, Barbara Kaczy\u0144ska, MA, Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski and the Institute team produced a documentary on Grzegorz P\u0142onka entitled: \u201cMy Moonlight Sonata\u201d, which during the Festival of Documentary Forms NURT in Kielce, received the Annual Special Award of Radio Kielce \u201cfor the artistry of sound in documentary form\u201d. The artistic achievements of Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski\u2019s patients were presented in the \u201cInterrupted Silence\u201d musical staged in 2019 by the Warsaw Chamber Opera. The libretto was written by Professor Skar\u017cy\u0144ski with music composed by Prof. Krzesimir D\u0119bski, and it was directed by Micha\u0142 Znaniecki. Prof. Henryk Skar\u017cy\u0144ski also describes many achievements of his patients in his movie novel \u201cReturn of Beethoven\u201d published a year ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
World Hearing Day, initiated by the World Health Organization (WHO), is celebrated on March 3 each year. Its objective is to raise awareness about the prevention of deafness and hearing loss and to promote hearing prevention worldwide. The main celebration ..<\/p>\n