LAGOS – An expert in ear, nose and throat (ENT), Dr Dayo Bamigboye, on Thursday advised that the right treatment of children’s ear infection will prevent hearing impairment.
Bamigboye, who works with the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi-Araba, gave the advice in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos.
The Otolaryngologist said that it was necessary to treat ear infection, because it had the tendency to recur.
“But, the most important thing about ear infection is the tendency to recur and that is where the appropriate treatment comes in.
“What is significant about recurrence, because it tends to in the long run impair hearing and the fact that it impairs the middle ear’s transmission mechanism of sound.
“So, usually, we will advise that for every child that has had an ear infection, it should be appropriately evaluated and properly treated.
“Otherwise, haphazard treatment will still lead to hearing impairment which will not be obvious today.
“But, in the next 10 to 15 years, the person now presents with a kind of hearing impairment that we call conductive hearing losses.
“The significance of that comes when it tends to impair on either education or the person’s job.
“So, ear infection should, apart from being treated, ensure that it is appropriately treated.
“One of the ways to also check is to do a hearing check after an infection for the person.”
The doctor said that upper respiratory tract infection was a single most important predisposition to ear infection in children.
He said that ear infection was divided into acute and chronic infections.
According to him, almost every child in their lifetime will have a form of acute infection.
He said that a study carried out at LUTH showed that ear infection was common in children between the ages of two and seven.
“In children between the ages of two and seven, one out of five of them will have an acute infection.
“The acute infections are of two types: the pus and the non-pus producing ones.
Bamigboye said that ear infection was preventable through proper environmental hygiene.
The expert urged parents to treat upper respiratory tract infection in their children because that was what predisposed children to ear infection.
He also urged school proprietors and crèche owners to ensure that children being admitted should be properly checked to prevent spread of infections. (NAN)
