Childhood hearing impairment is a common chronic condition that may have a major impact on acquisition of speech, social and physical development. Numerous literature states that injury to the vestibular organs may result in accompanying balance and motor development disorders. But still postural control and motor assessments are not a routine procedure in hearing impaired children. Hence, we aim to provide an overview on motor skill performance and balance in hearing impaired children.

Children with hearing impairment have balance and motor deficits primarily due to concomitant damage to the vestibular structures. Psycho-intellectual and social developmental disorders, as well as elimination of social activities and participation may diminish health-related quality of life in these children. Despite the documentation, assessment of balance, motor deficits, and health-related quality of life of these children are not included in the educational program, unless obvious neurological or orthopedic disorders are diagnosed. The objective of this review was to systematically analyze the available information in the literatures regarding the postural control, motor skills, and health-related quality of life in children with hearing impairment. Searches of data sources PubMed, MEDLINE, CINHAL, EMBASE, SCOPUS, ISI of web science, Cochrane Library, and AMED database were performed from the earliest to 7 February 2011. Study eligibility criteria included non-interventional studies that addressed postural control, motor skills, and health-related quality of life in children with hearing impairment. For each eligible article, data were extracted using custom-designed forms by a single investigator. Collected data included study demographics, study design, study population, sample size, outcome measures, and results. A total of 11,872 articles were retrieved, and 17 articles were found to be eligible for inclusion. Of the 17 articles included, five articles analyzed health-related quality of life alone, two articles analyzed balance alone, two articles analyzed motor performance alone, two articles analyzed vestibular dysfunction alone, two articles included both vestibular dysfunction and balance, two articles included both motor performance and balance, and two articles investigated vestibular, balance as well as motor impairments. Heterogeneity of the studies prevented us from performing methodological quality assessment and meta-analysis. The results of this review suggest that children with hearing impairment exhibit suboptimal levels of function in postural control, motor skill performance, and health-related quality of life.

ObjectiveTo compare the health-related quality of life (HRQOL) of primary school-age deaf children with or without motor impairment to that of typically developing peers.MethodsThis study was a prospective, cross sectional study. With age-matched controls, 100 children were analyzed in each of the following three categories: normal hearing, hearing impaired without motor impairment, and hearing impairment with motor impairment. The Paediatric Quality of Life Inventory (PedsQL™) version 4.0 was used to assess the HRQOL.ResultsHearing impairment along with motor impairment in children is associated with significantly increased proportions of suboptimal levels of function and significantly lower HRQOL. Children with hearing impairment and no motor impairment had significantly lower scores in the emotional health and school function domains of the PedsQL than children with normal hearing, but there was no significant difference in the physical and social health domain scores. Children with hearing impairment and motor impairment showed significantly lower scores in all domains of the PedsQL compared to children with normal hearing. Scores in all four domains of the PedsQL differed between children with hearing impairment and no motor impairment and children with hearing impairment and motor impairment.ConclusionThese findings indicate that children with hearing impairment, both with and without motor impairment, have a diminished health-related quality of life.

The findings of the study suggest that vestibular-specific neuromuscular training programme may improve the motor skills, balance and health-related quality of life in children with hearing impairment.

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