Hearing loss or Deafness is the most common sensory deficit in humans today.
- As per WHO estimates in India, approximately 63 million people, are suffering from significant auditory impairment.
- Large percentage is children between the ages of 0 to 14 years.
- With such a large number of hearing impaired young Indians, it amounts to a severe loss of productivity, both physical and economic.
Objectives of the Programme (NPPCD):-
- To prevent avoidable hearing loss on account of disease or injury.
- Early identification, diagnosis and treatment of ear problems responsible for hearing loss and deafness.
- To medically rehabilitate persons of all age groups, suffering with deafness.
- To strengthen the existing inter-sectoral linkages for continuity of the rehabilitation programme, for persons with deafness.
- To develop institutional capacity for ear care services by providing support for equipment, material and training personnel.
Long term objective-
To prevent and control major causes of Hearing impairment and deafness, so as to reduce the total disease burden by 25% of the existing burden by the end of 12th Five Year Plan.
Programme Execution & Expansion :-
- The Programme was a 100% Centrally Sponsored Scheme during 11th Five Year Plan.
- NPPCD was initiated in year 2007 on pilot mode in 25 districts of 11 State/ UTs.
- This Programme has been expanded to 192 districts of 20 States/ UTs.
- In the 12th Plan, it is proposed to expand the Programme to additional 200 districts in a phased manner probably covering all the States and Union territories by March, 2017.
Strategies :-
- To strengthen the service delivery for ear care.
- To develop human resource for ear care services.
- To promote public awareness through appropriate and effective IEC (Introduction, Education, Communication) strategies with special emphasis on prevention of deafness.
- To develop institutional capacity of the district hospitals, community health centres and primary health centers selected under the Programme.
Components of the Programme :-
- Training all Manpower and development – For prevention, early identification and management of hearing impaired and deafness cases, training would be provided from medical college level specialists (ENT and Audiology) to grass root level workers.
- Capacity building – for the district hospital, community health centres and primary health centre in respect of ENT/ Audiology infrastructure.
- Service provision– Early detection and management of hearing and speech impaired cases and rehabilitation, at different levels of Health care delivery system.
- Awareness generation through IEC activities – for early identification of hearing impaired, especially children so that timely management of such cases is possible and to remove the stigma attached to deafness.
Expected Benefits of the Programme :-
- Decrease in the severity/ extent of ear morbidity or hearing impairment.
- Availability of various services like prevention, early identification, treatment, referral, rehabilitation etc. for hearing impairment and deafness as the primary health centre/ community health centres / district hospitals largely cater to their need.
- Decrease in the magnitude of hearing impaired persons.
- Capacity building at the district hospitals to ensure better care.
Central Coordination Committee (CCC) :-
A Central Coordination Committee will be constituted at the central level with the following members to provide technical inputs and facilitate implementation of the Programme.
| Representatives of Directorate General of Health Services/Ministry of Health & Family Welfare | 2 |
| Adviser NPPCD | 1 |
| Representative of WHO | 1 |
| ENT specialists/experts | 2 |
| Audiologists and Speech therapists | 2 |
| Public Health expert | 1 |
| Representative of RCI | 1 |
- Central Level:-
- Central Cell- A support to the Programme Division in the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare will be provided by a team with necessary technical support to the States/District level functionaries in successfully implementing the programme.
- The Cell will be manned by following Manpower on contractual basis.
- National Consultants -2 (Monthly salary of Rs. 60000/- )
- Programme Assistants -1 (Monthly salary of Rs. 30000/-
- Data Entry Operator- 1 (Monthly salary of Rs. 15000/-)
- State level:-
- State Cell – To strengthen monitoring of the programme at State level.
- The Cell will be manned by following Manpower on contractual basis
- Consultant -1 (Monthly salary of Rs. 50000/-)
- Programme Assistant: 1 (Monthly salary of Rs. 25000/- )
- Data Entry Operator -1 (Monthly salary of Rs. 15000/- )
- District level:– District Health Society and Programme Committee (under NRHM)
- Functions=
- Planning : Preparation of District Micro-plan based on magnitude and distribution of deaf/hearing impaired persons and resources available for ear care.
- Implementation of the programme through utilization of government facilities, involvement of NGOs and community participation.
- Monitoring of programme: activities and quality control.
- Financial and Material Management.
- Social mobilization and public awareness
- District Hospital:
- It is proposed to strengthen the ear care services at district level by providing manpower support such as one ENT Surgeon, one Audiologist, one Audiometric Assistant and one Instructor for hearing impaired at each district on contractual basis.
- ENT Surgeon
- Audiologist (Audiologist & Speech language Pathologist)
- Audiometric Assistant
- Instructor for the Young Hearing Impaired Children.
Service Delivery and Referral System :-
- Primary level- CHCs/PHCs/SCs/Primary School teachers/Health Workers/ Panchayat
- Secondary level- District Hospital
- Tertiary level- State Medical College
Achievements :-
- Modules of training of doctors, multi purpose Workers and technicians have been developed.
- In some places such as Delhi, training of trainers has been started.
- This program is integrated with NRHM framework.